


A Dixon in Oak Haven

by Riastarstruck



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Dark Magic, Daryl Dixon & Beth Greene Friendship, Developing Friendships, Horror, M/M, Mild Gore, Protective Merle Dixon, Retired cop Rick, Sexual Tension, Slow Build, Small Towns, Sort Of, Spells & Enchantments, Witchcraft, non walker AU, witch!Daryl
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-28
Updated: 2018-01-04
Packaged: 2018-12-20 20:50:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 44,933
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11929026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Riastarstruck/pseuds/Riastarstruck
Summary: There had always been something strange about Daryl Dixon. In the small town of Oak Haven, his family had been outsiders for generations, frightening with their magic and rituals, never quite like anyone else.When Rick Grimes moves to town, strange things start happening and it's up to Daryl to stop what's hurting the town that has never accepted him and the man who seems to trust him.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first introductory chapter to a longer story, just kind of mapping out the history so it all makes sense.  
> This is a Rickyl fic, but it's a slow-grow one. Plot kind of barged in and kicked my dreams of it being a smutty, short fun fic to the curb and made this way longer than it was meant to be.  
> Huge thanks to Ijustwantedutoneedme and Starfire for encouraging me

There had always been something strange about the Murphy family. The town of Oak Haven had known it since the first of them arrived, a hundred years ago on the night of a summer storm which tore the roof off the school house.

Alice Murphy had been a young mother and a young widow. She arrived with her two-year-old daughter and shadows in their eyes.

The town of Oak Haven had taken the two bedraggled girls in, and they’d stayed with the widow Duvall in her large house on the outskirts of town. There, they flourished. Alice Murphy was sweet and charming, a childlike gleam in her eyes and a teasing curl to her lips. The townspeople whispered behind their hands how she danced barefoot in the tall grass and wove flowers in her hair, but for all her oddities, the town accepted them as one of their own.

But the Murphy family wasn’t like the other families in Oak Haven. They were strange people, who hung herbs from their ceilings and painted their faces on full moons. They danced in the long grass and wove spells and cures for every problem or ailment brought to them.

Alice’s daughter had been clever and quiet and her needlework was the finest many had ever seen. She married a local boy and together they had a son who had a fiery temper and his grandmother’s clever eyes. There were whispers and disapproving looks when, at age ten, the boy took his mother's name and became a Murphy.

For generations, the Murphy family lived on the outskirts of town, strange and unnatural but as much a part of the town as the trees that lined Main Street and the church that stood tall in the centre of town. Their magic was worrisome, strange and unnatural, but they kept it to themselves and went to church every Sunday, so the town let them be.

When, generations along, Ellie Murphy married a stranger to town, Will Dixon, her mother warned her against it. But nobody can tell a Murphy what to do, even one of the own.

Will Dixon brought more than mystery to Oak Haven when he arrived. He brought a criminal past, violence and disorder. He was rotten to the core, but Ellie loved him.

They had a son, Merle, and Will looked at his strong son and proclaimed him: “Dixon, through and through!” Merle grew up big and tough and mean, he was like his daddy and the town looked at them like they were something feral.

When Ellie had a second child, everyone was surprised. Since Alice Murphy had first arrived to Oak Haven, the Murphy’s had only ever had one child a generation. It was one of those things that everyone knew, but never acknowledged out loud, unsure what it could mean.

Daryl was a quiet baby who adored his big brother and was unaware of the surprise of his birth. Neither child knew then how the town whispered behind their hands about them, about Merle’s riot of dark curls like his dads and Daryl’s straight blond hair which darkened as he aged.

It’s funny how quickly people forget that Ellie Dixon had been born a Murphy. The Dixons were strange and different and not from around here, prone to violence and drink. In the towns mind, Ellie’s mother became the only Murphy and she lived her quiet, unremarkable life in the old house the Murphy’s had always lived in. Eventually, the town forgot that the Murphy’s had been there such a long time, that they’d arrived in a storm and were as much a part of the town as the trees that lined Main Street.

The town may have forgotten that Ellie was a Murphy, but her mother didn’t. The youngest Dixon spent most of his childhood in his grandmother’s house, on the outskirts of town. Merle didn’t like it in the stuffy old house but would walk him there in the morning and pick him up in the afternoon, eying the dark windows that gleamed in the light and seemed to stare down at him, disapprovingly.

Will Dixon had never liked Annabelle Murphy but he let his youngest see her because, despite all his shortcomings, he loved his wife and even after she was gone, when he was more anger than sense, more drink than sanity and prone to violence and fury, that love remained.

Daryl wasn’t like the other children. He was quiet and thoughtful with a fiery temper and a bad mouth. Things happened around him, like things had always happened around the Murphy’s. He spent his time alone or with his brother, at his grandmother’s house or in the woods. He didn’t like other people and had a way of looking at them which put them off. Sometimes he’d say things, innocuous little things which didn’t make sense until later, when the strap of their bag broke and the oranges they’d just brought rolled under the wheels of a passing car, or they got a call from the hospital about their father.

It was years later, after old Mrs Murphy had died, and Ellie and Will Dixon had passed away -years between them- when Daryl was twenty-three years old, and he saved vet Greene’s youngest daughter from an iced-over lake where she had been playing, that people began to remember.

He had carried her from the woods, limp with exhaustion in his arms, the pair of them soaked to the skin. Nobody knew why he’d been there that day, so deep in the woods by the Greene Farm, and he couldn’t say when he was asked. Whispers started following him, like they had when he was a little kid and strange things happened around him.

They started saying ‘ _Remember, he’s a Murphy, too’_.

 


	2. Chapter 2

When Daryl was six years old he’d sat on the dry, patchy earth behind his house and watched as a sparrow hopped, twisted and chirping brightly as it moved back and forth in front of him, shifting its wings at its side to a tune Daryl whistled. He’d laughed as it danced, hopping in time with his clapping hands.

His mom had heard him from the kitchen and came out at the noise, wiping her hands on her pale pink t-shirt as she approached her youngest son. When she saw the small dancing bird as it moved unnaturally, her steps quickened and she rushed across the dirt as her ears rang. She came to Daryl’s side and slapped him, one hard slap across his cheek which stopped the laughter instantly.

The bird flew off to peck at the ground a few feet away, unconcerned.

Daryl watched the small brown bird over his mother’s shoulder when she knelt in front of him, one hand on his burning cheek as though to soothe the sting and her eyes wide and panicked. “You can’t be doing that Daryl, you hear me?”

“I didn’t do anything.” Daryl insisted, but his mother hadn’t listened. Her wide, blue eyes had studied him, tracking over his face as though she might be able to see something he’d hidden from her.

That afternoon, his mom had stood by the kitchen sink and talked on the phone in a hushed voice. One eye on Daryl as he coloured in at the kitchen table, she’d twisted the cord of the phone around her fingers as she talked, wrapping and unwrapping them as she held the phone close to her ear.

The next day, when his daddy had gone to work, Daryl met his grandmother properly for the first time.

 

When Daryl was seven, he’d seen a woman in town with an ashy shadow spreading across her cheeks. It was Mrs Swinton from the library and Daryl had never seen the shadows on her before. He’d watched her with wide eyes before turning to his grandmother curiously.

Annabelle Murphy was also looking at Mrs Swinton, but her eyes were sad. When she turned to Daryl she offered him a small, sad smile.

“It happens dear, it just means she’s going to pass.” She told him in a low tone and wouldn’t say any more about it.

Over the years, Daryl would see the ashy shadow on numerous faces and he learnt not to stare, though he found it hard to look away when he passed a little boy, a few years younger than himself who had the same shadow across his cheeks as he reached for his inhaler.

 

When he’s eight, Daryl pushes Jim Sterling into the mud when he calls Daryl a redneck faggot. He felt a pressure in his chest which grew and grew and he clenched his fists like he could stop himself exploding and felt the pressure rush through his veins and prickle his fingers and toes when he watched Sterling try to get up. His limbs weren’t working, they slipped in the mud and couldn’t get any purchase. His flailing sends him back into the mud on his back, his arms and legs twitching where they lay. Daryl watched, feeling it in his blood when Sterling writhed on the ground as his shouts became panicked, his limbs failed him and the mud sucked him in deeper.

The pressure burst like a bubble when Merle grabbed Daryl's arm and pulled him away. Daryl glared at his brother and tried to pull back to where Sterling was pulling himself up from the mud, shaking and sobbing as he reclaimed control over his limbs.

He hadn’t expected the fist which knocked him to the ground, Merle breathing heavy, his eyes wide as he looked down at Daryl, fist still clenched.

 

Daryl is nine when his life changes. He’d spent the day distracted, attention drifting from the flowers he was helping pick in his grandmother’s garden. His distraction made him careless and he tied the string around a handful of lemongrass in the greenhouse, he pulled the string too tight and crushed them. The biting scent of the oil wafted into the air, citrus and sharp. His grandmother looked over to scold him, but in that second, he felt the restlessness of the day vanish and was replaced instead with a _pull_.

Dropping the bundle, Daryl took off running. Out of the greenhouse, across the yard and out onto the street. His sneakers pounded against the pavement and the plastic ends of his laces clicked against the ground as he ran. He couldn’t hear anything but his breaths and the pounding of his feet against the pavement.

He didn’t stop running until he was forced to by a fireman in uniform, who held him back from continuing straight into the inferno. The quiet in his head vanished and was replaced with a rush of blood and noises when he realised the building, with the flames still licking up the walls and smoke coming in dark plumes out the windows and drifting high towards the clouds, was his house.

The pull became a weight and with a certainty he would never understand, he knew his mom was dead.

He stood on the street, staring at his house and the firemen who worked to put out the flames.

When his grandmother caught up with him, she held onto his shoulders and watched with him in silent solidarity. The smoke was thick and heavy, smelling deep and ashy, staining the inside of his nose, but there was a sharp note which snuck in underneath it, the bite of lemon from the oils which still coated his fingers, though it had dried and become sticky on the flesh of his hands as he ran.

 

Daryl had never known much about his mom’s magic. When she married Will Dixon she’d stopped performing spells, though she still soothed skinned knees with chamomile and rubbed lavender on their temples to help them sleep.

His grandmother said she’d never really taken to the spells like Daryl had, she could brew a potion or mix up a poultice if she tried, but her real power had come in charm. People _liked_ Ellie, were drawn to her and would do anything if she asked them to with the right smile on her lips. Daryl had seen it, though he hadn’t realised what it was he was seeing at the time, and his daddy had gotten into more than one fight over it.

Magic came more easily to Daryl. He liked working with the plants from his grandmother’s garden, he picked up why they were used and what they were good for quickly. It made sense in a way he didn’t bother examining, it was natural and right that when two things meet, a reaction occurs. He found the elements soothing to work with and learnt quickly how to channel his will into an action, to balance what he wished with what should be.

Daryl got used to listening to the nudge in his head which told him to turn left instead of right and buy apples instead of pears. He got used to reaching for the phone a moment before it rang and taking the mint leaves when he thought he needed the sage.

Merle would roll his eyes when he returned from the shops with things they hadn’t needed but he didn’t say anything, just put the small potted aloe behind the toaster and didn’t say anything when Daryl moved it to the windowsill. He pretended he didn’t notice when Daryl planted rosemary beside their door or turned left instead of right when they went hunting. He drank the tea’s Daryl made him but would bitch and complain the whole time.

Will Dixon never said anything about what Daryl did, he bitched about him spending so much time with his grandmother but made no effort to stop him. By the time he died he was a mean, spiteful man and his sons wore the scars of it in their skin and in their behaviour.

People didn’t like the Dixon family, they turned away from them in the street and checked their shelves after they’d left the shops. In turn, the Dixon’s didn’t like most people and spent their time away from town, staying in the woods and making their own entertainment. If that meant people didn’t notice when strange things happened around Daryl, all the better. Daryl had no desire to excuse his behaviour or explain why he did what he did.

Merle had learnt to just let Daryl do what he wanted, though he watched it sometimes with a mix of wariness and fear, he never once said anything about it, just watched grimly and puffed at his cigarette when Daryl painted lines on his face with deer blood when they hunted, and thanked the woods for every life they took. When Daryl finished, Merle would stomp through the tree’s back to the house without a word.

When Annabelle Murphy took to bed, Daryl was the one that stayed with her, reading to her when she was awake and feeding her broths and teas to ease the transition. When she slept, Daryl would sit in the chair in the corner of the room and read the books on spellcraft and ritual, the huge tomes of herb lore and future reading, filling his head with the cramped words to ease the ache in his heart as his grandmother faded slowly from this earth.

She was buried in the church cemetery and her service was the last time Daryl ever entered the church. He’d gone a lot as a child, sitting on the hard pew beside his grandmother and shifting restlessly in the hot, stuffy room. He’d never understood why she went when she was born to a practice which was scorned by the church. When he’d asked, she’d smiled and ran her fingers through his hair and told him “Faith is never wrong, and community keeps us strong.”

“But their faith _is_ wrong,” Daryl had insisted, “they can’t make things grow or stop poison or see how we see.” He’d pushed a thread of intent to one of the flowers in a vase beside him and watched it quiver and the pink deepen to a dark red, just to prove his point.

His grandmother stared at the rose before reaching a hand out to touch it, just barely, with her fingertips. Shaking herself, she’d turned back to Daryl. “It’s not about what can be done, it’s about what unites us. These people are our neighbours, our friends and those relationships are strong. Besides,” she smiled wickedly, “Its stops them running us out of town.” she said with a wink.

Daryl had never felt the same community his grandmother cherished, and when he and Merle left the cemetery that day, he’d never once gone back.

 

Daryl was twenty-three when he woke up one winter morning, antsy and restless for no reason. He hadn’t recognised it for what it was and so he’d paced the house, moving from room to room without a purpose, just looking out the windows but not really seeing anything.

By noon, Merle had had enough and dragged him to Hovath’s bar, where Daryl had sipped at his beer and fiddled with the bowl of nuts until the antsy feeling became too much, became a push he couldn’t ignore and he was on his feet and out the door, leaving Merle’s exasperated shouts behind him.

The push propelled him away from town and he moved at a jog, crossing the familiar streets and roads without seeing them, his vision narrowed to an unseen spot which his feet pulled him closer to. By the time he’d broken the tree line, he’d been at a steady run, moving through the familiar trees as though dancing with them. He remembered that they’d seemed to sigh and sway, herding him forward, clearing the path in front of him as he ran.

When he finally came to a stop he looked around, unsure why he had been brought to the lake on the outskirts of the Greene farm, where, for generations children from the town had swam in summer. The place was still and quiet, the winter air icy, filling the clearing with a mournful feeling as the surrounding trees stretched up towards the overcast, grey sky like darkened, broken bones.

For a moment, all Daryl could hear was his own breathing, laboured from his run, and the whistle of the wind through the trees.

The crack of the ice started like a groan. Daryl’s eyes turned to the lake and the small figure of the youngest Greene girl, Beth, who was skating on the ice, wrapped in a thick woollen coat and bright red mittens. The groan of the ice became louder and Daryl watched as the colour of it shifted seconds before a noise like lightning sounded and the ice cracked, the split moving across the surface quickly.

The figure of Beth was there one moment and vanished the next. Daryl moved forward and sped across the ice, his heartbeat loud in his ears and he tasted cinnamon on his tongue. The ice held beneath him, though he felt it trying to snap. He willed it to hold, to reform just long enough for him to pass.

When he made it to the spot where Beth had disappeared, he fell to his knees and pressed his hands against the fragile new ice which was already forming. It moved aside for him and held still as he reached into the icy water. It was like sticking his hand in a hornet’s nest, he reached blindly into the dark, grasping at water which slipped between his stiffening fingers. He heard shouting from the bank seconds before the nudge urged him to move forward. Stripping off his coat, he said a silent prayer and dived into the water, despite every bit of sense telling him not to.

Under the ice the world was silent. The roar in his ears quieted and the panic, which had clawed at him from the moment he saw Beth vanish beneath the ice, became still and hushed. The water was like concrete around him and he moved through it slowly, following the pull in his chest which dragged him down towards the bottom of the lake.

Light caught on her blonde hair, it glittered like silver in the dark and Daryl followed it like a beacon.

When he had his hands around her arm, she was as heavy as stone. Daryl fumbled with the fastenings of her coat, his chest growing tight and his head dizzy with the lack of air, but the moment she was released from the weight she became lighter in his arms and they made their way up towards where the light glittered through the ice like a stained-glass window.

Hands were helping to pull them up out of the water. Daryl let them take the weight of the young girl as he heaved himself up, through the ice. The air was like razor blades, slicing across his skin and his chest was tight and seized as he tried to gasp in breaths which wouldn’t come. There was sobbing and shouting at his side and Daryl forced his body to turn to the two girls beside him. The older Greene girl, Maggie, was kneeling over her sister, her hands working at Beth’s chest as she performed CPR, her thin, pale hands were crossed above her sister’s heart and she was sobbing between pleas, her face wet with tears and the sleeves of her jacket soaked through.

Daryl shifted his eyes to the pale girl on the ice. There was a dusting of dark shadow on her cheeks and Daryl’s throat pulled tight at the sight of it. On clumsy knees, he pulled himself towards her, his own cold forgotten as he searched her for any sign that she’d be okay.

He found it buried deep in her chest, a flicker of warmth which sputtered and struggled to stay lit. With a gentle hand he moved Maggie away. She resisted, cursing at him and holding on to her sister with desperate hands. Daryl let her stay and ignored her as he turned her eyes to the younger girl.

He didn’t know what he was doing. Acting on instinct and intuition, he closed his mind from distractions and pushed his will into the girl beneath his hands, easing it in like manoeuvring smoke. He couldn’t say how long he spent fanning the small flame inside her until it glowed again, weak but stronger than the ember he had found. He knew he’d been muttering to himself, half formed spells and incantations, prayers and blessings all tumbling together in a mishmash power which he eased slowly into the young girl.

The blue in her lips faded first, slipping away and leaving them pale and bloodless but Daryl didn’t let himself hope until he felt a flutter in her heart and her chest moved under his hands in a breath. It was a few, shallow breaths later when Maggie saw it too. She let out a cry which tore from her throat like a wounded animal and tears filled her eyes.

“Go get a damned doctor.” Daryl growled through his teeth which were now clicking together as the cold crept back in as awareness returned to his own body. Maggie stared at him for a moment before she realised what he’d said and scrambled to get up, she cast one more look at him and her sister on the ice before she took off at a run towards the house.

Daryl kept his hands over Beth’s chest, willing strength into her until he saw movement behind her lids and her breaths came a little stronger. Reaching for his discarded coat, he wrapped the thick fabric around her frame, the smell of cigarette smoke and sage seemed stronger than usual as it drifted off his coat and wrapped around the young girl. Then, with difficulty, he heaved himself up, Beth cradled in his arms and began the slow, painful walk towards town, each step like needles into bone and slowed down by the shaking of his limbs.

They were met halfway there by the doctor in his car, which came speeding down the dirt road.

Merle hadn’t said a word when he came to get Daryl from the doctor’s office where he’d been put to bed in the small ward they kept in the back. Merle’s eyes had been dark with worry and he’d held his shoulders tense and still, but had brought Daryl a change of clothes and sat beside his bed until the doctor discharged Daryl from his care.

 


	3. Chapter 3

Vet Greene came to visit Daryl a couple of days after his daughter was discharged from the doctor’s care. He was a big man, his hair going white, his beard neatly trimmed and the taste of tobacco and peppercorn in the air around him. He’d been the vet of Oak Haven for years and the Greene family had lived in the old farm house for generations, since the first Greene had built it.

When Daryl opened the door, he blinked at the old man in a suit standing in their messy front yard. The pair stared at each other for a moment in the cold morning air, until Daryl cleared his throat awkwardly and shifted against the doorjamb, glancing back into the house at his coat, which was draped over the couch where he’d left it the day before.

“I wanted to come by and thank you for what you did.” Mr Greene said, bringing Daryl’s attention back to him. His breath misted in the air and Daryl looked at the remains of snow at his feet, it was mostly mud at this point.

Stepping aside, Daryl nodded for Mr Greene to enter the house and received a nod of thanks in return.

The house Daryl shared with his brother was small, two cramped bedrooms and a bathroom off the main room. It was full of their stuff and bore the beating of two grown men in a small space. It seemed extra small with Mr Greene’s large frame standing between the kitchen and the back of the couch. Daryl closed the door behind him and shifted awkwardly where he stood, unsure what to do now that the old man was in his house. Darting a look into the kitchen, he eyed the steam curling up from the pot on the stove before crossing to it, ignoring the visitor.

The steam was sweet and rich dancing through the air, moved by its own impulse in complex swirls and patterns. Picking up the spoon he’d left on the counter, Daryl gave the contents one more stir and eyed the misty brown liquid. Satisfied, he dumped the spoon in the sink and lifted the pot and poured the contents through the strainer and into his waiting mug. The dregs of the ginger, cinnamon, peppercorn, basil and cloves caught in the mesh and he dumped it unceremoniously into the pot and left it to cool on the sink.

“Is that… tea?” Mr Greene asked from the other side of the kitchen. Daryl shot him a look and nodded as he reached for the jar of honey and doled out a teaspoon which he mixed into the steaming brew.

“Fighting off the cold.” Daryl offered the other man as he stirred the tea, six times clockwise, six times counter-clockwise before encouraging the tea from the bottom of the mug to the top with wave of his spoon, the liquid rippled and swayed before he removed the spoon and returned it to the sink and turned to the other man.

Mr Greene looked grim when Daryl looked at him and his eyes were on the mug held in Daryl’s hands.

“I hope you didn’t get sick for what you did,” he said earnestly. Daryl waved it away.

“’m fine. How’s your girl?” he asked over the rim of his mug, breathing in the thick steam before taking a healthy swallow of the hot tea. Mr Greene’s face brightened and a broad smile spread across his features.

“She’s doing fine, thanks to you. I can’t thank you enough for what you did for my little girl. She’s only thirteen and I almost lost her. If you hadn’t been there…” he trailed off and a shadow passed across his face.

Daryl shrugged and shifted his grip on the hot ceramic of his mug. “You’re welcome,” he mumbled, eyes darting around the room for something to settle on. When he glanced back at the visitor an amused smile had made itself at home on the old man’s face and he chuckled before his expression became serious again.

“If you ever need anything, you just have to ask. I owe you a debt I can’t hope to repay.” Mr Greene smiled again, “Now I’ll leave you to your day. Thank you again, Mr Dixon.” He extended a hand and Daryl studied it for a moment before releasing one hand from the mug and reached for it.

Mr Greene’s hand was rough from work but becoming soft with age. His grip was firm and his broad hand made Daryl’s own look almost dainty in comparison. When their palms met, Daryl picked through the impressions which came, chasing each thread to a distinctive end; it was easier now than it had been when he was younger.

Mr Greene’s hold was made of grief and knowledge, musty worn pages of a bible and liquor like anger in his blood, but that was older now, settling like muck at the bottom of a lake, slowly worn away by the current. Knotting tight through all of it was a bright gold thread, stronger than any of the others, and it shone as it wrapped around the others. It took Daryl a moment to catch it, to trace it to its root and find its heart. Love.

Pulling his hand back he let his lips twitch into a returning smile at the other man and walked him the four paces to the door. Daryl stood in the doorway and watched the old man make his way across the yard and to his car. When he was halfway down the road, Daryl closed the door and sunk down onto his couch.

 

Vet Greene’s visit to the Dixon property seemed to have caused the town a problem. Before his visit, Daryl and his brother were tolerated but not particularly welcome, they were just there and the town of Oak Haven made do. But after Mr Greene went to see the man who saved his daughter’s life, and continued to acknowledge him when he saw him in town, the townspeople didn’t know how to behave.

They settled on a begrudging acceptance of Daryl in town, nodding a greeting if they happened to catch his eye in the street but not going out of their way to do so.

 

On a bright, cold day, two weeks after he dived into a frozen lake, Beth Greene came running up to him in the middle of Main Street. Her pale blonde hair shone in the weak sunlight and her cheeks were rosy from the cold. She grinned at him and her wide blue eyes searched his face.

“Daddy said he went and saw you. He wouldn’t let me come, said I was still weak.” She said it all in a breath. Her voice high and sweet, and Daryl thought of a breeze through cornfields and honey. She blinked at him and her grin softened to a smile, “Thank you for saving me,” she said. Daryl shifted his grip on the case of beer in his arms and shrugged.

“Don’t do it again,” he grumbled around the cigarette in his mouth, “fucking stupid thing to do, going out on the ice.” He scowled at the young girl, but her smile just brightened.

“I promise I won’t.” she said with a nod. She opened her mouth to say more but a call from an older woman across the road jerked her head to one side. She looked back at Daryl. “I gotta go, but I just wanted to thank you.” With that, she darted across the road and took the hand of the woman who had called her.

Shaking his head, Daryl continued down the street to his pickup and turned his mind from freezing waters and the calm dark under the ice.

From then on, Beth Greene would stop and chat with him when she saw him in the street, ignoring the scandalised and worried glances her behaviour brought. Daryl expected her dad to warn her off, but whenever he saw the old man he simply offered Daryl a smile and a nod in greeting, sometimes a few words in passing, Beth continued to seek Daryl out and eventually, Daryl got used to her chatter and bright smiles when he went into town.

Merle was rarely seen in town, and as he became involved with various gangs in the surrounding, larger towns, he didn't have the time to spend pestering Daryl as much as he used to. The brothers were still close, but Daryl preferred his solitude in the woods to the bars and parties Merle revelled in.

Daryl spent a lot of time at the house on the outskirts of town where his grandmother had lived. The walls were so full of history and generations of magic that it whispered from the wallpaper and chimed in the creak of the old furniture.

He continued to maintain the garden and greenhouse, harvesting the plants and preserving them to best keep their properties. He spent days in the kitchen curing and drying the ingredients, grinding some to a fine powder, letting others stew in their own juices. The house was familiar and welcomed him every time he came. He could lose hours in the kitchen and the garden and knew the exact place for each book in the Murphy family collection, and which book was best for what.

Merle rarely came to the Murphy house with him, but Daryl didn’t mind, it was his private sanctuary, second only to the woods where he really belonged.

 

It was a Tuesday afternoon when there was a tentative knock on the front door of the old house. Daryl looked towards the door from where he was sitting in the front room, rolling a cigarette. He considered ignoring it, but the knock came again.

Sticking the cigarette between his lips, he crossed to the front door and jerked it open. It groaned on old hinges, but opened smoothly to reveal an older woman in a cream blouse and knee-length skirt. She jumped when she saw him, as if not expecting him, though he was the only one it could have been. He looked at her expectantly and leaned his weight against the door. The woman lifted a hand to fiddle with a string of small pearls around her neck and darted a quick look around them before settling her brown eyes on Daryl.

“I knew Annabelle.” She opened in a low voice which bubbled over his grandmother’s name. Daryl lifted an eyebrow because the whole town had known his grandmother. She seemed to read the thought on his face and squared her shoulders. “If what they’re saying about you is true, I was wondering if you could help me,” she ploughed on, ignoring how Daryl narrowed his eyes at her, “Annabelle used to make me this cream, you see. For my psoriasis…” her hand lifted from her pearls and she clasped them together in front of her. “Since she passed I haven’t been able to find anything as good.” she finished, almost apologetically.

Daryl studied the older woman before he moved the unlit cigarette from his lips to behind his ear. Opening the door wider, he nodding her in. She paused before crossing the threshold, eying him from his bare feet to his messy hair, she visibly steeled herself before accepting the silent invitation. Entering the house, she looking around curiously.

Crossing to the kitchen, Daryl left the door standing open and listened as her smart heels clicked against the floorboards as she followed behind him.

“You got a name?” Daryl asked, reaching for one of the leather bound books his grandmother had kept. Filled with her neat, small handwriting each journal held pages and pages of recipes and spells she worked for various people.

“Caroline Reilly.” She replied as she entered the kitchen, eyes drifting around the space, lingering on the clumps of dried herbs and flowers which hung from the ceiling. Daryl grunted and flipped through the pages until he found the right entry.

He read it through twice and skimmed the additions and notes his grandmother had put in the margin, before he made a circuit of the large room, picking out the ingredients as he passed. When he reached for sweet cloves,his eye caught on a small vial of oil from Kava Kava leaves and he grabbed it too.

Unloading the ingredients onto the large kitchen table, he set about combining them all in the large stone mortar he favoured. He worked in silence, aware of the woman who had perched herself on a tall stool and was watching him work. He concentrated on the grind of the pestle against the stone bowl and threaded healing and soothing energy through the paste as it formed. When the ingredients were combined, he reached for the small bottle of Kava Kava oil and uncorked it, letting the rich green scent drift up. It hadn’t been a part of his grandmother’s recipe, but it called to be added and he tipped it carefully, watching the oil slip from the mouth of the vial and into the paste.

He continued working, and by the time he was finished he had a smooth, creamy salve in a glass jar for the old woman. She eyed it curiously before accepting it with thanks and excused herself from the house. Daryl watched her go and saw the way she moved, like she was old and tired, a little more cautiously than she should. She’d hidden it well when she entered behind a confidence she didn’t entirely feel.

“And quit smoking.” He called after her, knowing in his bones that she snuck a cigarette in the mornings before her husband woke up.

After that, people started coming to Daryl for all sorts of reasons. Most of them were nervous, eying him like he was an unfriendly dog and twitching around like a kid trying to buy weed off one of the dropouts who hung around the convenience store. Word soon got around that he was willing to make the things they needed and despite his surly behaviour, made them well.

He expected the regulars, and those they referred to him, to become less twitchy and guilty about seeing him over time, but that didn’t seem to happen. They knew to only approach him at the Murphy house and not at all if Merle was around. Some of the regulars relaxed once they were inside the house, away from anyone seeing them, but others remained uncomfortable around him until they could leave, their remedies clutched tightly to them and shielded from view.

Daryl didn’t mind doing it, he mixed salves and teas, diagnosed a couple of allergies, made witch-bags, tokens of good luck and tonics for fertility and health.

His grandmother had always done these things for the town, and she had been a figure people went to for comfort. Daryl had seen her in the front room of the house taking tea with sobbing women and nervous men more times than he could remember growing up, he’d watched them from around corners and through the banister rails, keeping quiet and still as he watched with wide, curious eyes, soaking it all in.

Helping people was just what she did. He remembered helping her in the kitchen and had learnt most of the skills by helping her make things for the people of the town. But despite her standing and her trusted confidence, she had never really been a part of it, no Murphy ever was.

The people of Oak Haven were a religious lot and the herbs and remedies of the strange family were accepted, but never really allowed by the church or its most devoted pupils.

The more Daryl worked for the people of the town, the easier it became. He could see what they needed before they said anything, could read the aches in their bodies and the rattle in their chests. He could read their intent to seek him out before they’d even fully realised it themselves.

Their ailments and needs read like dark spots on their skin and Daryl quickly learnt to read them and knew what they needed to fix it. Less and less he looked at the notes his grandmother had made in her books, and instead, made his own recipes and teas, altering them to each person’s needs.

It didn’t mean he became friendlier. He worked how he wanted to and that was often with a cigarette between his lips and his feet still dirty from a walk in the woods. He didn’t like people lingering and didn’t mind telling them what he thought. He was rude and surly and drank too much with Merle, but what he made was pure and strong with good intention and well wishes.

By the time Beth was fifteen, Daryl has a small group of regular customers who bought things off him, requested in hushed voices and with darting eyes. Beth had taken to spending a couple of afternoons a week after school at the Murphy house, helping him sort out his workroom and keep track of the money spent and paid.

Daryl grumbled and shouted at her for a while, but she would just leave without a word and come back the next day as though nothing had happened. Eventually, Daryl stopped trying to scare her off.

The increase in time the young girl spent with Daryl didn’t go unnoticed and Daryl became the focus of an angry town, whispers and sneers followed him. Beth had always been a regular fixture at the church with her family, involved in the choir, youth programs and general church business and in their eyes, that made her the concern of the whole town.

 

Daryl had been dozing in the backyard of the house he shared with Merle when a knock came on the front door. Pulling himself up from his lawn chair, he made his way around the side of the house on silent steps. He eyed the figure in black who was standing nervously at his front door, hands held in a tight clasp behind his back and bald head gleaming in the afternoon light.

Father Gabriel was a gentle, softly spoken man who had been in Oak Haven for nearly ten years, he was big on community involvement and was generally well liked in town. Daryl had never spoken to him, having quit church before his arrival, and had seen no reason to give him a moment's thought.

Daryl stuck a cigarette between his lips and scratched at his chest where his shirt fell open, undone in the hot afternoon. He was barefoot and sweaty, he’d spent the morning in the woods and the dirt was still on his fingers and his feet, caking on the fraying ends of his jeans.

“You’re a long way from church.” he greeted, bowing his head to catch the flame of his match and puffing to encourage the end to burn hot.

Father Gabriel whirled around, eyes wide and narrow mouth falling open in surprise at his voice.

“Mr Dixon,” he greeted, collecting himself. His dark eyes flicked over Daryl’s form and his lips tensing in disapproval.

Neither man said anything and the silence stretched between them, filling the dismal shade offered by the house. Daryl eyed the priests black suit and polished shoes critically. The back of his own shirt was sticking between his shoulders and his jeans felt heavy in the humid afternoon, sweat glistened on the priest's dark brow but his suit was neatly pressed and he moved like he didn't even notice the heavy fabric.

Snapping out of his own thoughts, Father Gabriel cleared his throat and squared his shoulders, knitting his fingers together in front of him and spoke. “Mr Dixon,” he repeated, “I’m here because I’m worried about the young Miss Greene.” he said formally.

“So talk to her old man.” Daryl snorted and retreated back around the house, interest lost in the conversation. He heard the priest scramble to follow him, his polished shoes slipping on the bare dirt and clumps of grass which made up their lawn.

“I have,” Gabriel huffed, “He was… less concerned than I feel he should be.” he grumbled, following behind Daryl as he rounded the side of the house. Daryl sunk back down into his lawn chair and watched the priest from beneath lowered lashes as he tried to regain his confidence.

After a moment, Gabriel spoke. “I’m concerned by her association with you. A girl that young is impressionable, they’re easily swayed and I think that if you were a good man at all, you’d stop your association with her and this-” his eyes darted around the back of the house, at the remnants of his last hunt, bones laid out to dry and tokens on an altar at the entrance of the woods, and swallowed.

“This what?” Daryl asked pleasantly, picking up the woven figure laced through with silk threads he’d been knotting together before he’d dozed off, and looking up the priest properly. “come on, Padre, you can say the word, can't you?” Daryl stood up, unfurling to his full height. He wasn’t much taller than the other man, but he was broader and the priest swallowed thickly but held his ground, Daryl stepped closer, “Come on, it’s easy, starts with a Wuh… Wuh…” he took a drag of his cigarette and let the smoke blow into the priest’s face, “ _witchcraft._ ”

A muscle in the other man’s jaw twitched and Daryl rolled his eyes and stepped back. “It’s not a dirty word.” he snarled and crossed to the back door, on the threshold he looked at the priest standing stiffly in his backyard. “I’ve tried to get Beth to leave me alone, last thing I need's a damn bible-bashin’, choir-girl hanging around. I can’t make the girl do anything, she’s got her own mind.” slamming the door closed behind him, he retreated into the house before Gabriel could say anything more.

 

When Beth knocked on the window of the Murphy house’s back door the next day, Daryl ignored it, refusing to look up at the girl that could see him through the window. When the knock came again, more insistent, Daryl turned his back on the door entirely.

When it became clear Daryl wasn’t going to let her in the house, she settled herself outside and started singing. She got through half of some religious song Daryl had heard the choir practicing when he passed, continuing to knock periodically, before Daryl threw the chalk he was using onto the table and crossed the kitchen to throw open the door.

Her expression was hazy through the screen door, but he knew it well enough to know there was a shine of victory in her large, blue eyes.

“Go the fuck home!” he barked. She took a surprised step back before halting and planting her hands on her hips.

“Why? What’d I do?” She demanded.

“You annoyed the ever-loving crap out of me, and now I got fucking priests knocking on my door and telling me to stop corrupting their flock. I didn’t ask for that, I sure as shit don't want it. So fuck off home.” Through the screen door, Daryl saw her eyes go wide at his tirade and her mouth fell open.

“Father Gabriel came to see you?” she asked, sounding shocked. Daryl snorted.

“Did I stutter?” he grumbled, “now go on home.” he narrowed his eyes at her and closed the door firmly between them.

Making his way through the kitchen, chalk work abandoned on the table, he retreated to the front room with its dusty old armchairs and shelves of books, refusing to look back out the window to where Beth stood.

 

The rising tensions came to a head on Main Street. A snide comment pitched just loud enough to carry halted Beth in her tracks. She turned on Mrs Crowley and Mrs Rowlings, two senior ladies who ran several of the church gatherings and had a firm, if outdated view on how a good town should be ran. Beth had been almost vibrating with anger, worn down by the snide remarks and insinuations which had followed her like a bad smell for weeks.

Surprisingly, it was Maggie Greene who defused the situation before her sister was pushed to defend her friendship or lose her connection to her church out of sheer stubbornness and her innate sense of what was right.

Maggie broke in, stepping between Beth and the two gossiping women. Pushing her sister gently to the side, Maggie squared off against them.

“What are you calling my sister?” she demanded, hands on her hips and almond eyes flashing.

Beth had refused to stop going around to the Murphy house and helping Daryl. Eventually, Daryl had let her back into the house and they hadn’t discussed it again. But the disapproval and gossip of the town mounted and it was impossible to ignore. The more looks shot her way, the higher Beth held her chin up, defiant and strong willed. It was inevitable that it would reach some kind of climax and it was only the level of destruction left after that was unknown. Maggie knew and loved her sister, she’d seen the explosion coming for weeks.

Mrs Crowley lifted her chin and pursed her thin lips as she met Maggie’s gaze.

“We’re not calling her anything. Beth is a sweet girl, but it’s no secret that your sister is consorting with the wrong sort.” Crowley said, letting her voice carry to all the listening ears on Main Street.

“It sounds a lot like you’re saying she’s just a pretty girl being led around by some boy,” Maggie snapped “if you knew her at all, you’d know my sister is better than that, she’s better than most of this town. Daryl isn’t the _wrong sort_ he’s just not one of you.” she continued, unconcerned by the attention she was attracting or the way the two women in front of her were fluttering like outraged birds. “Has my sister ever missed a day of church? Has she ever missed a day of school? She’s not some dumb girl who's been led astray and you owe it to her to treat her better than this.” With that, Maggie turned on her heel and left, Beth hurrying to keep up, her face hot with a flush but a smile curling at the corners of her mouth.

It didn’t stop the dark looks in Daryl’s direction or the whispering from some of the town. But the almost frenzied opposition had cooled and Beth continued as she always had, helping at the church and spending a couple of afternoons a week with Daryl. When it became apparent that this was the new norm, the gossip dwindled, though no one really seemed sure how or why Beth had taken to Daryl so strongly, and would defend him so readily.

 

It was a cool Wednesday morning when Daryl turned left instead of right like he normally would. He felt a gentle tug, a pull which started somewhere at the base of his spine, and followed it as it lead him through the town towards Willow Street, off the main stretch of town. The tug pulled him up short in front of the empty shop towards the end of the street, shadowed by an old spruce tree. He had a vague idea that it might have been a craft shop at some point, but he didn’t come to this part of town often and couldn't be sure.

Standing under the awning in front of it, he could feel the crackle of his magic come to life under his skin. There wasn't much to see through the windows of the shop, a dusty and dark interior with shelves behind a wooden counter and a doorway leading to the back of the store, but Daryl found it difficult to look away.

With a grunt, he turned away and retreated back down the street, ignoring the tug in his chest which pulled unpleasantly, like a fishhook under his ribs and left him distracted and annoyed. He had to remake a tea for the delivery boy in the next town over four times before he got it right and he should have been able to make it in his sleep.

He continued to ignore the tug which became more insistent when he closed up the Murphy house and made his way back to his house, purposely turning away from the vacant shop, only to beat his hands against the steering wheel and swear furiously when he was forced to divert because of a downed tree and ended up passing the empty shop from the other direction.

Getting out of the pickup, Daryl slammed the door shut and crossed to the shopfront where he stood, hands on hips and glared at the empty store as he listened to the crack and buzz of energy which whispered through the dusty glass.

There was a soothing energy about the place, deep rooted and ingrained in the mortar of the building. It had seeped into the wallpaper which still hung on the walls and rooted itself deep into the foundations and the very structure of the building in a way Daryl hadn’t seen in many places. It was different to the energy of the Murphy house, which had built up over time and came from the people who had lived and performed magic there. This energy was different, it came from the earth beneath like a underground brook accidentally tapped into.

He could feel the way his body hummed in response to the building, falling into sync with it. It was an unusual thing, to be so easily in tune with a place. The only other place which regularly soothed him and which hummed alongside his own innate magic was the woods which surrounded his home and which frequently welcomed him into its shadows.

“What did the shop do to you?” Beth’s bright voice interrupted the meditative state he’d slipped into listening to the shop. Daryl tore his eyes away from the dust motes which he could see dancing through the window and blinked at the young girl. She had her school backpack slung over one shoulder and her hair was falling out of the braid she habitually wore it in.

“Won’t leave me alone.” he grumbled. Beth’s eyes widened and she darted a look between Daryl and the shop.

Daryl didn’t often talk about the way the world was to him, Beth often pried, asking innocent questions about the teas and the creams he made and he knew she had noticed how sometimes he switched what he was doing without warning or made things for people who hadn't asked for it.

Daryl hadn’t ever really shared how he saw the world with anyone. His grandmother had understood, though even she had looked at Daryl in surprise sometimes or gently asked why he’d done something. But she had understood how impulse nudged him, how the world hummed and sang and the way people carried their histories and their heritages in their skin and the air around them. Merle looked at him sometimes like he was doing something strange when he let the universe guide him, but he never questioned him or doubted his intuition.

“Is it… haunted?” she hazarded a guess and didn't look offended when Daryl snorted loudly and cut her a look.

“No it ain’t haunted. It just keeps pulling me here.” he returned his eyes to the shop and studied the patterns in the dust which coated the front window. “I think it wants me to buy it,” he mumbled, mostly to himself, cocking an ear as the air around him hummed warmly.

Beth let out a noise. “Buy it? are you going to open a shop? I told you it was a good idea!” she chirped brightly, eyes wide with excitement. Daryl frowned at her, he didn’t think she’d ever said anything about opening a shop. She must have read the thought on his face because she rolled her eyes and huffed an exasperated breath.

“Do you listen to anything I say? I’ve been saying you should for months. Half the town buys things from you and more would if they didn't have to go to the Murphy house.”

Daryl’s eyes slipped back towards the shop and frowned at it. “The hell would I do with a shop?” he asked the shop and the girl at his side.

“Well you’d finally have a place to put all your herby stuff, I don’t know how you find anything in that kitchen.” she said as she turned a speculative eye to the shop.  “Maybe the old hardware on Leonard Street might be better,” she said thoughtfully, “it’d be cheaper and there's already a ton of shelves there...” she trailed off as Daryl shook his head, no longer listening.

“This place.” he told her decisively and she darted a look between them.

“Okay…” she said slowly, “well Sasha is the realtor, give her a call.” she shrugged, like it was that easy.

 

Daryl was pulled back to the empty shop the next day, and the day after. On the third day, he walked into the woods at dawn and didn’t come back until dusk.

When he emerged from the trees behind their house he had a string of rabbits hanging from one hand and blood painted on his cheeks. Merle passed him a beer and watched him cut open his catch, putting the organs in a large container and carefully skinned it. He used every part of his catch and insisted Merle did too. Eventually, Merle had stopped putting up a fight about it.

“What’s got your knickers in a twist?” Merle asked when Daryl had relaxed into his task and downed half his beer. Daryl ignored him and concentrated on removing the pelt. “You’ve been acting twitchy for days, you on something? Or is it that time of the month?” he pushed, watching Daryl from his sprawled position on his deck chair. Daryl shot his brother a glare which just made him grin, his teeth flashing in the light as he relaxed back further into his chair.

They drank the rest of the beers and Merle drove them to the liquor store for more. Daryl drove them back as Merle lounged in the passenger seat, open beer can in hand. When he pulled into the gas station for some cigarettes and to fill up, Merle stayed in the truck, turning up the stereo as Daryl climbed out.

The cashier, a spotty nineteen-year-old whose sister sang in the choir with Beth, eyed Daryl nervously as he entered, but did his job with his eyes lowered except for the occasional glance he shot at the security monitor beside him. Daryl suspected he was checking they were still working and filming.

Daryl handed over a few crumpled notes with a snort and felt his eyes drift to the cluttered counter. His attention was caught by the lottery sign and when the kid handed his change over, he looked at the new, crisp notes in his hand and shrugged when it was the right amount for a single ticket.

Dropping the money back on the counter, he told the kid what he wanted as he unwrapped the foil on his cigarettes and extracted one, plucking it between his lips as he was handed his ticket.

Shoving it into his pocket, he nodding his thanks and made his way out of the station and towards the truck, where Merle was singling along to the stereo, playing air guitar along with it in his slouched position.

 

Daryl forgot about the lottery ticket. Two days later, he was cursing Merle out for shaking the can of beer he’d passed to Daryl, as he emptied his pockets onto the counter to strip out of them as Merle laughed like a hyena from the couch.

The lottery ticket unfurled where he put it, between his keys and some loose change, and Daryl glanced down at it as he listened to Merle flick on the tv in time to see a cascade of balls drop into a large clear dome and bounce about as it was turned.

Merle grumbled and lifted the remote to change the channel but Daryl stopped him.

“Leave it.” he murmured, his eyes fixed on the small screen.

Merle rolled his eyes and let out a belch before lifting his beer to his lips and turning his attention to the perky blond assistant on screen.

Each ball was picked and rolled its way down the pipe, announced as it popped up as a graphic along the bottom of the screen.

6

11

9

7

40

Daryl looked down at the ticket on the counter even though he didn’t have to, beer soaked pants forgotten as he heard the announcer call out the final number.

22

He glanced back at the screen and watched the flashing colours as they finished the draw. It wasn’t a particularly huge draw, not like the multi-million-dollar prize drawn a few weeks ago, but it was big enough.

Out the window, the woods rustled and hummed with energy, the cicadas warred with the crickets, their songs rising to a crescendo before drifting back to a murmur.

Daryl let out a small laugh, tapped his fingers against the paper and looked towards his brother.

“Guess I’m buying a shop.” he murmured.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for your comments! I'm so happy you're enjoying it so far! (I'm terrible at replying lol sorry, but I appreciate them :D)


	4. Chapter 4

The small shop on Willow street never got a name. The walls were lined with shelves and bowls of things cluttered the counter which sat along the length of one wall.

Beth had insisted on a table beneath the window which she used as a display and changed around every couple of days. She put a vase of fresh flowers in the centre each week and only complained a little when some of the blooms migrated to the workshop in the back.

Daryl blamed Beth entirely for it being an actual shop. Daryl had no interest in running one and saw no point in making things with no one in mind for the finished product. But the soaps he made, wrapped in linen and with general good health and one or two more focused intents, sold well, so did the small tokens of luck and prosperity that sat on the counter and teas in the jars beside the window.

The rest of the shop was mostly a storeroom for his workshop out the back. Beth insisted it was all for sale, but most people wouldn’t know what to do with the roots, seeds, cured plants, oils, powders, dirts and finished mixes he lined the walls with.

The chandelier of twisted vines, knotted string and bones which hung down from the high ceiling and swayed in an unfelt breeze sometimes, happened mostly by accident, and a need Daryl had felt to store some of the older bones he’d collected over the years, the aged ones that were smooth to the touch and soaked up the knowledge surrounding them.

When the final part was hung, a sun-bleached rabbits skull which sat at the lowest point of the cone, Daryl felt the energy of the shop shift slightly, as though clicking into alignment. No longer spreading out, seeping wherever it could go like poorly contained water. The shop seemed to breathe a sigh of relief as the energy, which came up from deep inside the earth, finally settled.

The back room of the shop held the large wooden table from the Murphy house and was habitually full of Daryl’s work. To one side of the room sat a desk where papers and notebooks piled high, full of Beth’s neat notes and tables of stock and sales, alongside Daryl’s messy scrawls of lists, recipes and words he came across in books and knew would be useful.

Buried deep in the shop behind a door which had swelled shut when he found it, was a small unused room which Daryl entered with a reverence much like he felt for the heart of the woods. In this small room, the energy was thick and heady, the heart of the shop and the heart of the leak. He drew runes on the floor in soft chalk, ash and ochre, they curled around each other, as though dancing and formed as though they had always been there like ripples on the floor. In candlelight, they seemed to swim before his eyes, moving like live snakes and undulating to the flow of the building.

Nobody but Daryl entered that room, Beth shied away from it without even realising. But Daryl felt at peace there, focused and intent, like he and his magic were one, no barrier of skin or flesh between them.

 

“You know, it wouldn’t kill you to come to church,” Beth said, like she did most Sundays when she picked up her basket of products before heading to the morning service at the church. Daryl snorted, listening to the clink of glass under the patterned cloth she draped over the contents.

“People don’t want anyone knowing I make shit for them, if I’m the one handing them out there won't be much guessing.” Daryl replied, like he did every time Beth started suggesting Daryl make the rounds or go to church with her.

He lifted a corner of the cloth and slipped a small sachet of pale green powder in. “That’s for that Sawyer guy, tell him to put a pinch in his nightcap.” He turned away before Beth could say widower Sawyer hadn’t requested anything. “Besides, people like getting this stuff from you, makes them feel less sinful.”

“Well maybe if you weren't so surly they wouldn't be so scared of you.” she said with a huff and turned with a flick of her blond head and made her way out of the workshop. Daryl listened as she made her way through the shop and exited with the ring of the bell over the door.

Task done, Daryl lowered himself down onto the couch he kept in the corner and closed his eyes. Sundays were his most profitable day, though he didn’t open the shop and Beth only sometimes bothered to when she came from lunch with her family after Sunday service.

She made most of the deliveries before and after church as the congregation mingled, and if she had any deliveries left over, she made them after she finished spending time with her family. Returning to the shop in the late afternoon to drop off the basket and the small envelopes of money. It was a profitable, if secret, business.

Though it really wasn’t that secret. It was one of those things that everybody knew, but nobody discussed. As long as it wasn’t hurting anyone or shoved in anyone’s face, it was allowed to continue, unmentioned.

If someone really wanted to consult Daryl, they either came to the shop, ducking in when the street was empty, sometimes catching Daryl right when he unlocked the door, or they found a way to get word to him.

It wasn’t the sobbing women and nervous men who had taken comfort in his grandmother, but it was his own brand of council. His surly demeanour and the fact that he was a Dixon seemed softened somehow by the fact that he ran a shop, as though it legitimised him somehow; and as Beth had told him before he opened it, more people were comfortable approaching him on what they saw as neutral territory.

Some people weren’t even skittish or ashamed to approach him or be seen entering the shop. The guys that ran the bakery two doors down chatted cheerfully with Daryl when he came in, and the more serious of the two, Aaron, often dropped off left-overs when they closed for the day and had put Daryl in touch with his supplier who stocked rock salt and raw sugar for a very reasonable price.

 

Daryl dozed most of the day away, pottering about the workshop when he woke up and the hours slipped away easily in the quiet hum of the shop.

When the bell over the door jingled, Daryl rolled his eyes at the noise and thought for the millionth time that he had to remove it. He made a mental note to do it next Sunday when Beth was out and hide it so she couldn’t hang it back up.

He continued dividing and sorting the bones of the snake vertebrae into piles and listened as Beth made her way through the shop and into the back. Pushing through the curtain, she curled her nose at the thick smell of burnt grass and blanched when she saw what Daryl was doing, but crossed to the desk and started pulling out the envelopes from her deliveries. She dumped the cash out and counted it, making careful notes in her notebook as she went.

“Jane wants double her tonic for next month.” she mumbled.

“Not happening.” Daryl snorted, Beth ignored him.

“Arnie doesn’t need any more cream after this dose, and Tyrese was wondering if you could come and see him, I think it’s about a sex thing.” she rattled off as she finished counting the money and making notes before putting the money and notebook into the drawer of the desk. Daryl clenched his teeth around his annoyance when she didn’t elaborate.

“Tyrese?” he prompted.

“Tyrese Williams.” she supplied. At his blank look she huffed at him. “The butcher.” She waited for Daryl to grunt in acknowledgement before pulling herself up onto the workbench, swinging her feet. “Have you heard?” she asked. Daryl didn’t answer and after a moment Beth continued anyway, “There a new cop in town. Or he was a cop, I don’t think he is anymore. He’s moved here from the city, him and two kids in the old Curtis place.” she continued to swing her feel but when Daryl glanced at her she had her lips pulled into her mouth and was watching him with bright eyes. He played with the small bit of bone in his hand, running the pads of his fingers over the complex design as he waited.

Her smile broke across her face and she shrugged, flicking her braid over her shoulder. “He’s very handsome.” she conceded.

Daryl rolled his eyes and flicked the last bone into the correct pile and began moving the piles into small, bare wooden bowls with a circle of different colors painted on each one. “If he’s old enough to have a couple of kids and have been a cop, he’s too damn old for you. Your daddy would wring your neck for even thinking it.” he grumbled. Nodding his head towards the front of the shop he told her “Go help Jacquie look at soaps.”

The bell over the door jingled and with a laugh, Beth jumped down from the workbench and disappeared through the curtain. Daryl listen to her greet the older woman cheerfully and as the two began chatting, Daryl shook his head and continued working.

 

Even as an outsider of the town, gossip reached Daryl frequently, often multiple versions of the same story. That was the problem with quiet, sleepy small towns that haven’t changed much over the years, everything new was interesting and everything unusual was even more so.

That was why, when Eric leant against the counter display of cakes and muffins when Daryl dropped by to get some bread and asked Daryl “ _Have you heard about the new guy?_ ” Daryl snorted.

When he’d gone to see Tyrese as requested, the large butcher had skirted around the topic he needed assistance with by informing Daryl on everything he knew about the newest member of the town and the work he thought needed doing on the old Curtis house.

When Dennis came by the shop to pick up her weekly supply of peppermint tea, she and Beth had debated whether the new guy had been a homicide detective or a patrol cop, comparing what they each knew.

Dale, the owner of Hovath’s bar had mentioned the new resident of Oak Haven when Daryl sat at the bar, dropping in his name, _Rick Grimes_ , as Daryl waiting for Merle to get back from the can in the back.

He couldn’t help but wonder if the frenzy over his own association with Beth had been as unavoidable as hearing about the new ex-cop that had moved to town.

Daryl rolled his eyes as he handed Aaron his money and replied to Eric. "Beth works for me. Of course I've heard about the damn new guy." He nodded his thanks when Aaron passed him his change.

"He came in here with his kids," Eric continued, "really polite, the both of them and the baby was just the sweetest thing." He leant further across the counter a little but barely lowered his voice. Aaron smiled at him as he watched, "I heard he was a cop in the city, a detective."

"Goddamn this fucking town, man." Daryl said shaking his head and shoved his change in his pocket. He frowned at the bright-eyed man who was smiling at him conspiratorially. “I’m beginning to think this guy’s more god than man," he grumbled, rolling his eyes as he pulled out his packet of cigarettes and extracted one which he slipped between his lips.

"So am I!" Eric said with a crow of laughter. Daryl shot Aaron a look and caught his eye. Aaron smiled broadly, his eyes sparkling with mirth as he wrapped an arm around Eric’s waist.

"Oh, I agree." He said with a laugh which buzzed in Daryl’s head like the crackle of dried grass in the sun with a smooth note of turned, fertile earth beneath it.

Daryl shook his head at the pair and grabbed his bag off the counter, waving a hand absently over his shoulder as he left the shop before fishing out his lighter from his pocket.

 

Daryl was working on the first stage of a tonic for Tyrese, it had to be left for a cycle before the second stage could begin, when the bell over the door in the shop broke his concentration. He cursed when his hand slipped and the line he had been drawing on the clay pot in charcoal veered off course. With a growl, he glared towards the shop when a male’s voice came, followed by the bright chirp of Beth’s greeting.

Daryl tasted gunpowder and salt, hot earth and the deep smell of new growth deep in the woods. He cocked his head to listen, having to strain to catch the low rumble of the unfamiliar man’s voice.

“...from the green grocers sent me here, said no matter what, he could never get plums as good as yours.” the stranger was saying. Beth let out a laugh.

“He’s jealous Daryl grows such good ones. Best in the state I’d wager.” she said and Daryl heard her move from behind the counter towards a crate in the corner where they kept some of the fruit the Murphy garden produced.

Daryl took a cautious step forward and caught the folds of the curtain separating the rooms with one finger.

The man continued, “I wasn’t sure this was the right place until… well, until I saw inside.”

Daryl peered around the curtain and saw the back of a man’s head as he looked around the shop. His hands were on his narrow hips as he twisted to take in the whole shop, attention seemingly caught by the chandelier above him.

“We don’t really need advertising,” Beth said, “we don’t get many people from out of town and everyone here knows Daryl.” She said with a shrug, one hand rose to fiddle with the tail of her braid which lay over her shoulder. The man turned back to Beth, finished with his inspection of the shop.

He was an older man, a few years older than Daryl, with a neatly cropped salt and pepper beard and dark hair which haloed his head. His cheekbones were sharp and his lips were pink. When he smiled, his face transformed with laugh lines and the flash of white teeth, making him look suddenly lighter. Daryl’s eyes drifted down his long, thin body, taking in the tanned forearms revealed by rolled up sleeves and his narrow hips and strong shoulders. As he studied the man, Daryl noticed a blur of shadow over his chest, wrapping around his side and sitting under his arm like a sling. He squinted at it, taking in the dark smudge which was mirrored in the man’s blue eyes.

Daryl stepped out, pushing the curtain aside and leant against the doorjamb, watching as Beth bagged up a handful of plump plums in a brown paper bag on the counter.

“And two tablespoons of the bottle on the right, the green one.” Daryl found himself saying. Beth jumped, but the man only flicked his eyes towards him.

“That’s okay, I don’t need that.” he broke in politely, but Beth was already reaching for the bottle, knowing when Daryl would insist.

“Yes you do.” Daryl dismissed, “It’ll help you heal.” he said with a small nod of his head to the man’s side. The stranger stiffened, body growing still and taut as he narrowed his bright eyes at Daryl.

“I am healed.” he growled, deep like thunder. Daryl crossed his arms over his chest and shrugged.

“Not well,” he nodded to the powder Beth had tipped into a small plastic sachet and sealed. “If you drink tea, put a pinch of that in it. If not, have oatmeal for breakfast and put a pinch on that. It’s sweet and got a bit of a weird taste, so I wouldn’t recommend putting it on any other food. Once a day, till it’s gone.” he rattled off, eyes darting to the smudge over the man’s chest without meaning to. The man looked like he wanted to argue, but closed his teeth on it as he reached for the bag of plums and the sachet of powder, reaching for his wallet in his back pocket.

“On the house, welcome to Oak Haven.” Daryl said lowly and retreated back to the workshop.

It was a cloudy, overcast day where the air sat heavy and thick against the earth, a week after that meeting, when Daryl felt a tug, starting at the base of his spine and shooting through his limbs, propelling him into movement.

The bottle he’d been returning to a shelf by the window in the shop, slipped from his fingers and shattered when it made contact with the hardwood floorboards. There was enough time to get a smell of sharp, hot eucalyptus in his nose before he was running. The bell above the door jingling cheerfully and drowning out the shout of surprise Beth let out when he pushed past her.

There had been no building tension, no antsy restlessness like ants under his skin like he’d had the day Beth went under the ice or the day his mom died. The tug pulled him with the same driving need to act, the same impulse which pulled him across the town, but unlike with Beth, this one came on like lightning, like the crack of a whip and it rocked through his body, knotting his stomach and buzzing in his head like bees.

People turned to stare as he ran down Main Street, brushing past Dale and Aaron who were chatting in the street, past the priest outside his church who stopped to stare. The soles of his boots pounded against the pavement. One of his laces were untied and the hard plastic end clicked against the ground as he ran.

He barely registered the house he was pulled to, his mind taken up by the haze of intent, of driving need. Two steps up onto the small, boxy porch Daryl tried the handle of the brown front door as he knocked, fist pounding against the wood as he let out a call through the wood. The buzz in his head became a roar and he could taste something bitter and astringent in the back of his throat. He knew in his blood they needed to wake up, and he found himself repeating it to himself, in a shout and a whisper as he pounded on the wood. Inside the old house there were three sparks of life, and one was spluttering and fading fast.

Taking a step back, he braced himself to kick in the door, threading strength and will and determination into the impact. The door cracked open with the sound of splintering wood and Daryl surged forward, pushing it the rest of the way open with his shoulder. He moved through the place blind, eyes unseeing as he let the spark guide him through the spaces.

Behind him, coming in through the door at a run he tasted yeast and bread, the cinnamon spark of adventure and the earthy musk he associated with Aaron, followed closely by Dale’s familiar spark of kindness, history and sadness mixed with beer and fish.

“In the back room!” Daryl called at them, “There’s two people.” He was pulled, harder than he’d ever been before, like a knife in his gut dragging him deeper into the house.

His throat was tight when he crossed the threshold into one room and saw the cot in the corner, and the still, small figure lying placidly atop the blankets.

She felt small in his arms, insubstantial except for the buzz of sweetness and new growth. She seemed to hum with energies, the protective threads of love and family woven tightly around her.

Daryl couldn’t remember making it out of the house, but the clean, heavy air of the hot day was sweet and fresh when he made it out to the front yard, the small life cradled in his arms. He gasped in deep lungful’s of air, not having realised how hard it had been to breathe.

There was commotion around him, Aaron and Dale making it out of the house, their shirts held over their mouths and noses, a man and a boy staggering beside them and held up by the two men as the neighbours crowding in towards the scene.

Daryl turned to the life in his arms, willing the fresh air into the small lungs which were breathing so shallowly, purging her body of the bad, the gas which made her energy slow and sluggish.

The man tore away from Dale’s arms and staggered towards Daryl. It was only when strong, calloused hands were pulling the baby out of his arms that Daryl realise who it was. Rick Grimes was wide eyed and panicked, his own breaths fighting in his chest as he struggled to stay upright, but his grip on his daughter was sturdy as he cradled her to his chest.

Daryl cast his eyes back to the house, attention called by something deep in the building. It weaved through the polluted air, heavier than the carbon monoxide which shivered in front of Daryl’s eyes. This was something different and as he stared at the vacant windows which stared back at him, Daryl could taste cardamom and burnt marrow. It clung to his throat like smoke and seemed to promise things within its sweet, earthy notes. The shadows in the house seemed to shift and writhe, moving fluid like mercury or tar.

“... _Daryl? Daryl?_ ” a hand flickered in front of Daryl’s view of the house and he blinked dumbly as the world rushed back towards him.

Blinking at Dale, Daryl’s attention was torn between the house in front of him and the rising chaos around them as the neighbours crowded close, fussing over the Grimes family as the sound of sirens could be heard approaching.

Merle wouldn’t look at Daryl when he came to pick him up from the hospital in the next town. Merle’s blue eyes were bloodshot and cloudy, his skin flushed and dry. He stood off to the side as Daryl gave his statement to a uniformed police officer who took notes in a small black notebook and thanked him absently before leaving.

In the car back to their house, Merle cast glances towards Daryl from beneath his frown, scarred hands clenching around the steering wheel.

“The whole town’s talking.” Merle said lowly. Daryl slanted him a look before closing his eyes against the headache which had settled in.

“The town always does,” he grumbled. Beside him, Merle let out a growl.

“You gotta be more careful. You want this place going Salem on your ass?” Merle asked through clenched teeth, eyes fixed out the windshield.

“They won’t.” Daryl murmured, low and tired.

“You don’t see it, the way they look at you.”

Daryl let out a bitter sounding laugh and opened his eyes to look at his brother. “I’ve seen it. I’ve seen it every day since I was born. They look at me like I’m wrong, like I’m dangerous, like-”

“Because you are.” Merle snapped, cutting him off. Daryl pulled himself up, anger sparking hot and he opened his mouth to start yelling. Merle cut him a look, face hard set and blue eyes wide, his temper sparking to match Daryl’s “No, shut up!” he ordered, pointing a finger towards Daryl before returning his hand to the wheel, “To them you are. They tell stories about you smearing yourself with blood, about silver knives and keeping pots of poison in the cupboards. They see how you look at them all knowing, knowing secrets they ain’t ever told anyone before and damn it, they’re scared of you.” he swallowed thickly “You don’t get it because that’s how you’ve always been, you’ve always seen the things no one wants talked about. They see your pretty face and think it’s hiding something.” Merle’s voice went quiet and deep, accent going thick and filling the cab of the car. Daryl felt himself quivering with anger, body tense as he held himself back from lashing out, from shouting and screaming about how unfair it was.

“Then what the hell am I meant to do?” he asked, low and dark through clenched teeth as he kept his eyes pinned on his brother. “I try to stay away. I keep my distance. I don’t say or do half the things I could. I don’t talk about Mr Egan picking up men down past Monroe, or Ms Peterson having sex with her student. I don’t talk about how the doc sometimes gives patients who aren’t gonna make it too much morphine, or how he dreams about it at night and hates himself.” his voice was going tight and desperate, as the words rushed out of him “I don’t say half the shit I hear or know, the poison creeping through their blood or making them sick and wrong, or mad and sad I don’t look too long when I see someone’s gonna die soon. I shut up and keep my head down-”

“And go running across the town to nearly kill yourself trying to save people!” Merle cut him off with a shout, his fist coming down on the steering wheel with a bang, making Daryl jump. Daryl wrapped his arms around himself and sunk back into the seat, turning his eyes out the window.

“They weren’t meant to die.” he uttered, barely above a whisper. Merle turned his head to look at Daryl properly, his face curiously blank as he studied his brother in the passenger seat.

“You don’t see how that scares people?” he asked, low and almost gentle. Daryl looked away, focusing on the sign to Oak Haven as it passed, on its neat white board and blue writing welcoming visitors.

“I didn’t know I was running until I was halfway there,” he confessed. And in a way, it was true.

The pull had propelled him, taken over his limbs and demanded he move, but for a moment it had felt like he was travelling outside his body, moving on the wind and leaving his flesh behind.

Merle was wrong, he knew not to say things like that, to not say how he threaded power into his limbs and for a moment, had felt like he was capable of anything, of flying, of tearing the walls off that building and if he had to, breathing life back into that small, tiny human in his arms. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rick's here! He's finally here!
> 
> You guys, your comments and Kudos are just wonderful! Thank you all so much, I'm so glad you like this weird little story
> 
> p.s it's about to get weirder and witchier


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter may be a the shortest in the story, but I promise you the next chapter is BIG  
> Enjoy!

Merle was right.

Daryl didn’t notice at first that the town was looking at him differently, that some were outright avoiding him. He’d supposed it would be like the time after Beth fell through the ice, a little gossip, some questioning glances and lingering looks, but no outward change from their usual behaviour towards him.

But it was different this time. Merle said it was became when it happened with Beth, nobody saw him running. He could have been in the woods for a hundred reasons, it was coincidence, good timing, luck. Merle had played his part in diffusing the situation, saying Daryl’d been in the woods that day, that they left the bar earlier than they actually did. A hundred little pinpricks in the thought that something _weird_ had happened.

But Daryl had run through town in the middle of the afternoon this time, and witnesses whispered about how his steps hadn’t faltered, even once. How he moved through the space without seeing it. How he hadn’t heard Aaron calling after him as he followed, just continued on, like an arrow pointing north, unfaltering and undeterred.

Daryl kept to himself, rarely coming out of the workshop when he was there. He finished his orders but didn’t start any new ones. The shop had never been busy, but it had its regulars and its curious visitors dotted through the day; but for the first few days after the incident, not a soul entered the shop besides Beth. She’d sat in the workshop and watched Daryl work in silence, wide blue eyes fixed on him as though seeing him for the first time and Daryl tried hard to ignore it.

When he wasn’t needed at the shop, he avoided the town. He tending to the Murphy garden, stayed with his brother or vanished into the woods. Under the canopy of trees, amongst the dense, hot growth Daryl let himself be soothed. He wandered deep into the belly of the woods, where the air was sweet and the energy of the place was strong and settled in his bones like a warm embrace.

On the hottest afternoon, when even the insects were too tired to hum and buzz in their usual symphony and he trudged his way through the under-bush, Daryl felt a chill crawl down his spine.

He stilled, awareness expanding out and slipping between the trees which held still for him, as though holding their breath to show Daryl the way. Out of the corner of his eyes he saw movement and he whipped his head around to try and catch it. It slipped ahead of him, keeping to the edges of his vision and refusing to be caught.

Daryl stopped trying to catch sight of it. He stood in the small clearing and expanded his awareness, trying to catch a hint of what was trespassing between the trees. It hummed at the edges of his awareness, slipping like oil away from being known. With a gasp of hot air into his lungs, Daryl’s eyes opened to the bright afternoon as the sounds of the woods rushed back in. There was no trace of the unfamiliar presence. The trees seemed to shiver and shake around him, unsettled like Daryl. As he moved between them, making his way back home, he laid his hand along the bark of the trees he passed and their energy hummed as though offering and accepting comfort.

The next day, after almost a week of distancing himself, Daryl returned to his shop and opened it at the usual time, flipping the sign on the door to Open. Beth had insisted on having one, though usually she was the only one that turned it.

He set to work in the workshop, sorting and curing the plants from the Murphy garden he’d been ignoring and losing himself in the familiar and welcoming routines.

When Beth came in at her usual time, nothing was said about the past few days and they continued on as always.

Around lunchtime on a Saturday, Beth ducked out to do some shopping around town and Daryl was left to man the shop. While he helped Dennis with her teas, the bell over the door rang. Daryl glanced up at the smell of gunpowder and new growth and saw Rick Grimes adjusting his hold on his daughter as he closed the door behind himself.

Daryl nodded a greeting which was returned and shifted his attention back to Dennis who was chatting happily as she rummaged around her bag for change. Rick Grimes’s presence tingled at the edge of Daryl’s awareness, leaving a trail of conflicting energies as he wandered around the shop, chatting quietly with the small girl in his arms as he studied the jars on display around the room.

Dennis left with a wave, attention on arranging the contents of her bag to fit the tea as she fumbled with the door.

Looking to the other man in the shop, Daryl found himself already being studied by pale blue eyes. As the bell jingled loudly to announce Dennis’s departure and the baby in Rick’s arms gurgled happily, Daryl shifted his weight against the counter and cast a quick look over the other man, as though the ordeal of a week ago might have left a mark on him. He frowned slightly when his eyes settled on the blur over his chest, the dark shadow of illness which looked like it might be worse than it had been the first time they met.

“You haven’t been using that powder.” Daryl scolded, folding his arms over his chest. Rick blinked in surprise, his eyes darting to the shelf of bottles behind Daryl and back to the owner.

“I was a cop too long to accept mysterious powders from strangers.” he said eventually, adjusting his daughter's position in his arms. Daryl rolled his eyes.

“You have to do something, or it’s just going to get worse.” he said as his eyes slipped again to the shadow on the other man’s chest. It was wrong, but he couldn’t figure out what it was. It wasn’t like a cancer or a wound inflicted with violence, Daryl hadn’t seen anything like it before, injuries weren’t imposed on a body like this one seemed to be, they altered the form, saturated it, but this seemed at once apart and entwined.

“It’s fine.” Rick said, voice clipped. He took a deep breath and shook his head, casting a look down at his daughter and when he returned his eyes to Daryl he looked calmer and a little amused. “I don’t know how you knew we needed help, but I want to thank you for what you did for us, for my daughter.”

Daryl shifted behind the counter, uncrossing and recrossing his arms, unsure what to do. It reminded him of a similar visit he’d had when he was years younger and Hershel Greene had stood in his small home. It seemed like Daryl was destined to endure earnest thanks by fathers for saving their daughters.

Casting a glance at the small girl in the other man’s arms, Daryl couldn’t help but hope that this one didn’t end up quite as persistent as Beth.

Daryl met Rick’s wide, earnest eyes and shrugged one shoulder. “You’re welcome?” he offered and let out a laugh to match Rick’s when he realised how weird it sounded.

“I just wanted to thank you.” Rick said, the corners of his eyes crinkling with a smile.

“Do you want a drink?” Daryl found himself asking, the words slipping out of his mouth without checking in with his brain. Rick’s eyes widened slightly before he shrugged.

“Sure.” In his arms, his daughter gurgled and grabbed hold of her father’s shirt.

 

Rick looked curiously around the workshop when he ducked past the curtain separating the shop from the back. Daryl cast a look around as he entered behind the older man, trying to see it through a stranger's eyes. Beth always said it was disorganised and chaotic, but Daryl felt at home in the place, knew where everything was, where they wanted to be, and it made sense to listen to the wills of the room and what filled it.

As Daryl made his way over to the small kitchen area, Rick perched himself on one of the stools at the workbench, seating his daughter on a clear patch of the table.

The cups rattled in their saucers and Daryl ran a finger over the fine bone lip as though to sooth it. He didn’t use them often, though Beth did when a consultation looked like it was going to take a while. Daryl let her because she enjoyed playing the southern hostess, and it seemed to settle the visitors, though Daryl usually avoided using the cups, preferring the heavy mug he’d used since he was a child and had brought over with the tea set from the Murphy house.

It was always hard to resist peering into the small, delicate cups on their matching saucers, they were nosey and intrusive, always prying into the drinker’s business.

Rick looked momentarily surprised when Daryl set the saucers down on the work bench and proceeded to pour them each a cup. The baby cooed happily and Daryl cast a quick glance at her before lowering the teapot and crossing back over to the bar fridge and returning with a juice box.

“You don’t look like a juice box kinda guy.” Rick said as he accepted the box from him and prepared it for his daughter who accepted it happily.

“They’re Beth's.” Daryl grunted, as he shifted a saucer and cup closer to the other man.

“Right, your… assistant?” Rick asked, flicking a look towards Daryl as he reached a hand towards the drink and brought it closer to him.

Daryl grunted.

The pair sat in an awkward silence as they sipped at their tea. It was a blend his grandmother had used often, soothing and healing, sweet to taste but not unpleasantly so. Rick’s slightly dubious expression cleared as he drank it and he relaxed into his seat, sharing smiles with his daughter between curious glances around the workshop.

Daryl savoured his own cup and eyed the unfinished poultice he’d been making for Hershel when Dennis had interrupted him. He needed more charcoal, he decided as he studied it from across the workbench.

With a content hum, Rick lowered his cup back into the delicate saucer. Daryl eyed the teacup before lowering his own without the care Rick had shown to its match, and with a finger hooked on the other man’s saucer, he pulled the used cup towards him.

Daryl narrowed his attention down to the fine, white china. With a flick of his wrist he turned the cup upside down and tapped the makers mark on the bottom three times before turning it right way up and looking inside. He twisted the cup in a clockwise direction and studied the soggy dregs which clung to the bottom.

"So, am I going to meet a beautiful stranger who will bring me wealth?" Rick’s voice cut in, bringing him back from the dark swirls that whispered of the future.

Daryl let out a snort and rolled his eyes as he lowered the cup back onto the saucer.

"Hardly," he scoffed, "you need to eat more greens." He grumbled, looking up at the other man through his fringe to see Rick’s face split into a wide grin as he let out a laugh.

Daryl’s attention was pulled back down at the cup in his hands, his eyes lingered on the shape of a lion, a symbol of loyalty and leaving behind something big, of moving on. Surrounding the lion was a halo of darkness which circled the cup, unwelcome and out of place. If he looked deeper, they writhed like snakes.

Twisting his own teacup sitting in its saucer, he eyed the last of the amber liquid before lifting the cup and downing it in one swallow. He cast a glance at his own leaves but didn’t linger over them. The cups always pried, and he had no interest in learning more about himself.

When he looked back up at the other man, he found himself being studied by Rick, whose blue eyes seemed to see every minute move he made. Averting his eyes, Daryl rested his palm against the thick wooden workbench and concentrated on the hum of the buildings energies. He felt strangely exposed under the other man’s regard.

“How did you know we needed help?” Rick asked in a low, gentle voice. Daryl shrugged and turned his eyes to tracing the grain of the wood beneath his hand.

“I didn’t. Was just lucky I was in the area.” He said, sticking to the lie he’d told Beth and Eric and the doctor. As a story, it had so many holes it could be used as a sieve, but a lie should always be simple and nobody would believe anything he said, why put the effort into something elaborate, but equally full of holes.

Rick didn’t look impressed and was opening his mouth to say something when the bell above the shop door rang. Daryl rose, sparing Rick a fleeting glance before disappearing past the curtains to help Sasha who was shifting uncomfortably at the counter, her attention on a bowl of quartz by the register.

Rick ducked out with a wave and a happy gurgle from his daughter before Daryl had finished with Sasha. Daryl watched them pass by the window and felt a curious sense of disquiet to see them go.

When he returned to his workshop, he saw that Rick had washed the tea cups and they had been left to dry on the sink and the finished juice box was in the trash can in the corner. Returning the teacups and saucers to their place, he ran his fingers across the fine china and felt how they thrummed with new knowledge, the lion and shadow of the tea-leaves barely scratching the surface of all they’d seen in the other man.

Two days later, when Rick was returning after a trip to the bakery, he popped his head in the door. They had tea again, this time a dark vanilla blend with a twist of orange.

Neither man was quite sure how they ended up having afternoon tea together a couple of times a week. Sometimes with the small, happy Judith as company, other times alone; the space between them filled with easy conversation which drifted to every topic in slow, meandering trails. It was a brief moment of companionship and developing friendship in their lives, sweet with the treats one of them sometimes brought from the bakery and calming like the teas they shared.

When Beth found out, she sulked for an hour because she’d had to find out from Aaron, but Daryl didn’t mind. He didn’t know why he hadn’t told her, but it had been a nice secret to keep.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And thanks again for all the comments and Kudos, you guys are the best <3 <3


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a long chapter.   
> Also, a warning for dead animals. Nothing gory or gross or graphic, but there are dead animals in this chapter.

The front door of the house he shared with Merle stuck when he went to leave on a bright Wednesday morning. He frowned at the door, twisted the handle and pressed his weight against the wood more firmly. It opened, and Daryl squinted against the glare of the early sun as he stepped out into the warm day.

He paused before closing the door, a sudden feeling like he’d forgotten something stilled him from leaving. He had no idea what he could have forgotten and after a moment’s hesitation, he closed the front door, crossed to his truck and continued on to the Murphy house where he planned to spend the day in the greenhouse and setting a few things to cure.

The feeling stayed with him as he worked, settling between his shoulder blades like an itch he couldn’t scratch and he set his teeth as he concentrated on his work and refused to dwell on it.

It was the late afternoon when the knock came to the door. He looked up from the Tupperware container of curing fungus, and turned his eyes towards the front of the house.

Certain jobs had history to them, these histories were woven into the roles and sat around them like a protective halo. Doctors and nurses were healers, timeless and vital. They had a warm, deep smell which sparked almost like magic in his nose, it steadied the hands of surgeons and gentled the touch to the injured like a balm of its own, Teachers were scholars, the keepers of knowledge and vital to the evolution of man. Even in school, Daryl had been gentled by the energy of them, the whispers of history which suggested so much more than the small-town teachers could ever be. Cops were protectors, the knights of old and the watchmen of their communities. Their history was woven into their status and prickled across Daryl’s consciousness. He sometimes suspected his brother could sense them too, could read the tang of silver for protection and gunpowder for strength which always prickled at Daryl’s nose when they were near. Merle denied it the one time Daryl had brought it up, scoffing and saying there was only one witch and he had no mind for it.

The smell of cop lingered on Rick. It was seeped so deeply into his pores Daryl had to wonder if it had been there before he ever officially became one. It was soothing on Rick, familiar and like a gentle undertone. Unlike the smell that was at the door of the Murphy house which was sharp and acrid, almost violent with intent.

When Daryl opened the door, he cast a look at the two uniformed deputies on the old wooden porch. He situated himself in the opening, braced one hand on the doorjamb and held the door with the other, filling the space.

“Mr Dixon,” the cop on the left said, resting the butt of his palm on his belt buckle and shifting enough to draw attention to the gun on his hip. Daryl leaned more weight on the jamb so his arms flexed and the width of his shoulders was displayed.

They took him in cuffs to the police station, dumping him into an interrogation room and left him there. He’d been there before, hadn’t made a habit of it but with a last name like Dixon he was no stranger to being on the wrong side of the law. Only this time, he didn’t know what he was here for, didn’t know where Merle was or what was going to happen.

He laced his fingers in front of him on the tabletop so the chains of his cuffs didn’t pull and settled in to wait.

Places like police stations, even ones like Oak Haven, which had never hosted any truly violent or dangerous criminals, held a memory. The air was clouded with emotion, anger twisted in the air with fear and sadness. The energy left behind piled up, making the air stuffy and the shadows darker. Daryl meditated, breathing cleansing breaths into the air and let the slow ticking of the clock measure his heartbeat.

The man on the other side of the door paused before opening it, he hovered there on the edge of Daryl’s awareness. Daryl tasted silver gunpowder cop and old paper, tobacco and red wine. He didn’t know the man on the other side of the door and he cocked his head in thought, waiting for the strangers next move.

Opening his eyes when the door opened, Daryl studied the new arrival. He was dressed in a neat black suit and carried a folder casually by his side. His skin was dark and Daryl saw the deep swamps of southern Louisiana in his eyes, but when he introduced himself, there wasn’t much of the south in his voice.

“You’re a fed.” Daryl grumbled. The man ignored him, placing the folder on the table and pulling the chair across from Daryl out and lowering himself into it, one large hand holding his tie to him as he sat.

“You had a lot of interesting things in your house, Mr Dixon.” he said, eyes on the folder he was opening. When Daryl didn’t say anything, he looked up. “You had a few poisons amongst your things, some fungus we weren’t sure about, a whole lot of herbs and spices…” he looked at Daryl expectantly.

“None of it’s illegal.” Daryl grunted, the fed conceded with a nod.

“But it is strange behaviour,” he said calmly. Daryl shrugged one shoulder and the man’s eyes narrowed. “Particularly strange considering your brother,” he said coolly.

Daryl’s eyes narrowed. “My brother ain’t one for herbal teas.” he said lowly.

“And you are?” the other man asked, brows riding up.

“I don’t like doctors.” Daryl snapped. “Where’s my brother?”

“He’s in county lockup, waiting on charges of drug trafficking.” The fed told him, eyes fixed on Daryl for any tell.

“And why the hell am I here?”

“We had reason to search his property and when we found the array of suspect materials, we thought we’d bring you in too.”  he said and cocked his head, “You and your brother are into some freaky shit, huh?”

Daryl twisted his lips into a mocking smile and twisted his fingers together tightly. He could feel his magic writhing in his guts, feeding off his anger and turning dark and ugly. Concentrating on breathing, he tried to still the tide and cursed the concrete and metal room they were keeping him in. If the table was wood he could bleed some of the energy out into it without a problem, but metal conducted, it took what he fed into it and sent it back amplified.

“And did you find a single thing I’m not legally allowed to own?” he asked when he knew his voice would come out strong and curses wouldn't slip from his lips. The fed narrowed his eyes at him.

“There were a number of firearms-”

“All with permits.” Daryl cut in.

“An array of suspect herbs and powders-”

“All carefully labelled and stored.”

“The bones we found-”

“All animal. We hunt.” he kept his eyes locked with the fed and saw when his jaw twitched and he ran out of options. “If you can find anything over a misdemeanour offense I’ll eat my own ball. Are you going to let me go, or am I going to have to call a lawyer?” he challenged.

“I understand you have a shop in town and your late grandmother house.”

“Merle ain't on the deeds to either of them. You wanna search them, get a damn warrant.”

They let him go. he held himself stiff and still barely breathing as they released the cuffs and escorted them out of the building. Energy vibrated under his skin and he felt ugly words fill his throat and clenched his teeth against the desire to unleash them, to twine them with the energy and twist their fates and their luck until it turned rotten.

The fed stood at the entrance of the building and made it known he was watching Daryl as he left.

Daryl didn't relax until he felt the warm breeze press against him, sifting through his hair and wrapping itself around his form like an embrace, buffering him from intrusions, just for a moment as the fading light painted the town in blues and shadows.

His feet carried him towards the shop. The lock flicked open under his hand, the energy he’d kept so tightly reined-in slipping out of him and easing the way. He moved through the space easily, slipping through the shop and his workshop to the room at the back where he didn’t let anyone else go, where he retreated to make the purer magic, where there was nothing but the earth and him, the energy of the universe and his own skin the only barrier which kept them from becoming one.

In the chalk, ochre and ash painted room he sunk to the floor and let the hum of the room finally soothe him, easing the anger, frustration and worry. It slipped from his heart with the last of the muddied magic as it seeped into the marked floor where it could do no damage and return to the universe cleansed.

At some point, he fell asleep. A deep, restive sleep he rarely knew.

When Beth arrived the next morning, the door wouldn’t open for her. Daryl emerged after she’d knocked for twenty minutes. He didn’t say anything, just flicked the lock from within and retreated to his workshop.

He was brewing tea when she caught up with him, the air steamy and close, smelling like cloves and licorice.

“I heard-” she started twisting her fingers in the front of her blouse.

“Shut up.” Daryl snapped, not unkindly. He glanced across the work bench as he stirred the tea on the stove and changed the subject. “The soap for that woman should be done. wrap it up.”

Beth hesitated for a moment before nodding her head and crossing to the far side of the workbench, grabbing linen squares and twine as she went. Daryl watched as her nose scrunched up when she delicately sniffed the yellowed bar. He bit back a smile and pulled the tea off the heat, pouring it into two mugs and deposited one at Beth’s elbow. She smiled brightly in thanks and they sunk into silence as they worked, slipping into their usual routine easily and the air around them hummed contentedly.

 

The cops didn’t come, with or without a warrant. When Daryl closed the shop in the early afternoon, be breathed a blessing into the wood and turned for home determinedly.

He knew before he pulled up beside the house that he wasn’t going to like the mess the cops had left behind after their search. The air smelt coppery on his approach and he almost recoiled from the mix of energies which clogged up the house. Leaving the front door open, he made his way into the small house and observed the chaos.

There had been no effort made in tidying up after themselves, cupboards were left hanging open, there were spilled canisters and jars over the countertops, the cushions of the couch were on the ground with the zips open, the stuffing blooming out of them. With a sigh, Daryl set to work

Most of the herbs and plants had to be thrown out, their edges shrivelled at the unwanted intrusion which had sifted through them, their sweetness turned sour from ill intent. He put them all in a box to be disposed of and moved through the rooms, setting them to rights.

When order was for the most part restored, he lit the bundle of sage, sweetgrass and cedar he’d brought from the shop and began clearing the air with the smoking bundle. He moved through the space slowly, doing each corner first, starting with north and moving clockwise through the points of the compass, before lifting the bundle towards the ceiling as he moved back through the house.

Cleansing was all about dispelling negative energy which had crept in, returning the balance and lightening the air. He did it every couple of months, stepping over Merles legs as he went and humming gently under his breath when the need took him.

This was different thought, it was like wading through something thick and sticky, he could feel the air easing as he moved through it and concentrated on pushing good will into the air.

When he’d finished, the smell was thick in the small house but lighter, sweeter than the burnt sugar and salt taste the cops had left behind. Retrieving the broom he’d made with a length of wood he’d found in the woods and had carved slowly by hand over a month, before creating a head for it out of local hay, he started in the centre of the house and began the arduous job of his final cleanse.

His mind remained carefully calm and peaceful as he swept the debris of the cops search out of the house, his concentration narrowing to the repetitive task at hand.

He blames the slow, meditative space he had sunk into for why he didn’t hear the car pulling up the drive, or the crunch of steps approaching the house. When he reached the front door and glanced up to see Rick Grimes standing a few paces away, watching him with his head cocked, Daryl started.

“The hell are you doing here?” he snapped, fingers clenching around the handle of his broom.

“I heard your place got searched by the cops, I wondered if you needed a hand clearing up.” he offered. Daryl narrowed his eyes at him, nose twitching with the residue of silver and gunpowder which settled on the other man, he usually didn't mind it, liked the strength it leant to the other man, but right now all whisper of cop made Daryl’s skin crawl.

“It’s fine.” he grumbled, returning his attention to his work.

“They didn't leave a mess?” Rick asked hopefully. Daryl let out a snort.

“Course they did. Left the air like mud too.” he growled. Rick was quiet, like he always was when Daryl brought up things he didn’t quite understand.

“Let me help.” the other man tried again. Daryl felt his face contort in a sneer.

“I don’t need help from some cop.” he snapped, turning to him. Rick’s eyes widened in surprise.

“I’m not a cop anymore” he reminded gently and Daryl snorted again.

“Yeah you are. It sticks on you, it’s in your blood.” Daryl turned away and turned his attention back on sweeping. He heard Rick shifting outside the door before coming to some kind of decision and crossing to his car and driving away.

Daryl tried not to feel the weight in his chest which told him he shouldn’t have treated the other man like that, that it wasn’t his fault.

When Rick returned some time later with a paper bag of burgers, Daryl let him into the house and they ate in companionable silence until Rick had to leave and let the babysitter go. It felt good to sit with the other man, his energy mixing with Daryl’s own and settling in to the newly purified air of his house. With the pair of them sitting on the old couch, Daryl let himself lean against the other man when the cushions sagged and pushed them together.

Daryl settled into a routine with his brother gone. For the first couple of days he scanned the street every five minutes, looking for the fed or a cop. He saw the fed once or twice, a tall figure watching him with steady, dark eyes. His sharp suit out of place in the small town as he watched him from a distance.

Soon enough, after Merle was moved from local lock-up to jail and the case progressed, he stopped looking for the other man and settled into his life without his brother. Merle had been arrested and incarcerated a couple of times over the years, stretches of months and once, years, where the only contact the brothers had was phone calls; was a familiar absence, but one Daryl never really got used to.

The small house by the woods they shared was quiet without Merle. When Merle was asleep he snored, loud, chainsaw snores which Daryl had grown up listening to. When he was awake, he was always talking about something, rambling stories which had no point, or hollering at the tv he had up too loud. Even when they hunted together he made noise, his steps, though quiet, were a familiar rustle beside Daryl’s own silent steps.

He didn’t know if it was the new quiet or the lingering worry over the fed promising to stick his nose in, but Daryl felt like something was wrong. His skin prickled in the evening stillness and the early mornings. It felt like there was a sound just outside his hearing. When he crossed into the woods, he felt how unsettled the trees where; as though they were whispering to him, trying to tell him something he couldn’t make out.

The feeling came to him sometimes in town too. A chill would run down his spine despite the heat of the day or he’d find himself staring off into the distance, chasing a shadow he couldn’t quite make out.

When Beth came into the shop on a Sunday morning, later than usual and her expression pinched, he made her a tea and waved off her disputes about being late for church.

“The church is still gonna be there.” Daryl grumbled, placing the red mug down in front of her and turned to put the last couple of items into her basket. “What happened?” he asked.

“Nothing,” Beth said as she cupped her hands around the mug and lifted it to sniff the steam. A small smile curling at her lips and colour returning to her cheeks at the smell of vanilla and cinnamon, “I’m just being silly,” her pale lashes fluttered when Daryl crossed his arms over his chest and focused on her. Letting out a sigh, she adjusted her grip on her mug. “There were dead crows in the yard this morning. A whole bunch of them, just… lying there like they all just fell out of the sky or something.”

“How many?”

Beth shrugged, “I didn’t count, but from the porch to the barn there must have been a dozen. Daddy couldn’t see anything wrong with them, they were just dead.” She turned wide, blue eyes towards him and Daryl fought to not pepper her with questions, to pry every detail out of her.

“Drink your tea,” he ordered gently, “You’re going to be late.”

When she’d finished, Daryl saw her to the door and watched as she and her basket hurried down the street towards the church, a thin, blond figure in the morning sunshine, the blue of her dress glowing in the sunlight. When she vanished from sight, Daryl let the frown he’d been fighting spread across his features.

With a glance behind him at the still shop, he left the shop, locking the door behind him and climbed onto Merle’s bike, which he’d taken to riding with his brother in prison.

 

The Greene farm was a few miles out of town, it was an old farmhouse with white shutters and a wrap-around porch. Daryl had been there a time or two, and when he was a kid he’d swam in the lake on the edge of the property. No matter how many times he saw it, he didn’t think he’d ever be used to the idyllic house which groaned and creaked with history and time.

There was magic there, he could feel it, the house was too old not to have retained something. It wasn’t like the Murphy house or the shop. It wasn’t even the natural, raw magic of the woods. The energy that tingled across his skin was old and faint, it had layers which had built up over the years, generations of Greene’s living and dying in the rooms.

Pulling up to the farm, Daryl parked his bike beside the tree next to the drive and made his way on foot towards the house and farm buildings. Rounding the corner of the old house, Daryl’s steps came to an abrupt stop when he saw the stretch of drive between farmhouse and barn. The crows hadn’t been moved, their large black forms dotted the dusty earth, their wings folded by their sides and their eyes stared sightlessly up at the morning sky.

There was over a dozen, a couple of feet of space between each one. There was no discernible pattern to where they were laid, but there was an unnatural uniformity to their positioning. Crows, like most birds, tended to stick close together. They were more independent than pigeons or smaller birds, liking their space, but a group this size would never normally stand with such uniform distance between them.

Daryl’s throat felt dry as he looked at the scene in front of him, but he pushed his limbs into action and made his way into the audience of dead birds. Walking between them, he sought some kind of pattern or clue to why this had happened. Bending to inspect one, halfway between the house and the barn, he felt a chill race down his spine and smelt something oily he couldn’t identify.

The crow was stiff when he touched it. Its soft feathers smooth and cool beneath his fingers, but the unnatural stillness of the body made the sensation unpleasant. Running his fingers over the small form, he inspected it for any injury or sign of sickness. There was nothing but a faint oily scent and the feeling of wrongness which tingled in his fingertips.

“Daddy said not to touch them, they might be contaminated with something.” The voice came from behind him and Daryl turned his head to see Maggie Greene watching him from the edge of the dead birds. “He’s called animal control to take a look at them. Worried it might be contagious to the other animals.” She nodded her head towards the barn and the other, more modern building beside it Daryl knew was Hershel’s veterinary clinic, and the paddocks which stretched from the buildings to the woods in the distance.

Rising to his feet, Daryl turned in a slow circle, taking in the farm. He turned to Maggie when she spoke again, her voice softer this time, less sure.

“But it’s something else, isn’t it?”

Her eyes were different to her sisters. Where Beth’s eyes were bright blue and wide, guileless and perfectly bright, Maggie’s were green, almond shaped and sharp. When Daryl looked at her he smelt spice and lightning, a wildness trapped within the lean figure and he felt the very edges of something old and exciting which he couldn’t ever quite catch, just fleeting glimpses which reminded him of the stories in his grandmother’s books of impulsive magic which wiped out towns and brought the wrath of nature down in a blinding, shocking display of power.

“What do you mean?” Daryl asked, narrowing his eyes at her as she shifted, wrapping her arms around herself as though to ward off a chill.

“This ain’t natural. Anyone can see that,” she lifted her chin and kept her eyes trained on him. “I remember that day, you know. At the lake.”

Daryl looked away from her and back down at the dead crow at his feet. He and Maggie had never spoken about that day at the lake when he’d pulled Beth from the ice and he’d seen her flame barely an ember in her still chest. While Beth had been insistent upon a friendship with him, Maggie had happily kept her distance, always friendly, never discouraging his friendship with Beth, but always a little bit reserved.

“You’re gonna fix this, right? Whatever this is.” Maggie asked softly.

“I don’t know what it is.” Daryl admitted, beginning to walk between the birds. It was almost like paths between the bodies, winding trails which lead him through the carnage. Occasionally he’d catch a scent on the breeze or feel a crackle of energy and he’d pause where he stood and try to catch it, to get a good enough sense of it to trace it back to its core. Ever action had a purpose, nothing was truly chaotic or without reason. At the core of every action, every event, there was a reason and a hundred responses to it, fanning out like a spider’s web, he just had to find it.

Whenever he felt like he was getting close to grasping it, it slipped away from him, slick and ill-formed, as though there were too many threads to catch and each were pulling away from him whenever he felt like he might be getting close.

With a groan Daryl shook his head and pressed the heel of his hand against his forehead as though to physically push the headache that was forming out of his skull. He blinked around at the farm, his awareness expanding out again from the energies around him. The farm hadn’t changed, though the sun was higher than it had been when he’d gotten there.

Maggie was still standing just beyond the dead crows, watching him. She looked surprised when he focused on her, standing straighter and frowning at the way he was combing his fingers roughly across his scalp, trying to dislodge the pain which had settled in his head when he wasn’t paying attention.

“They’ll be back from church soon.” Maggie said into the quiet. Daryl cast a look back up to the position of the sun and realised she was right, over an hour had passed since he’d first seen the crows. “You could stay for lunch,” Maggie continued, “daddy wouldn’t mind.”

Daryl opened his mouth to decline, but the opportunity was taken from him by the arrival of two cars coming up the driveway. He recognised them as belonging to the Greene’s and he and Maggie watched their approach in silence.

“Mr Dixon.” Hershel greeted as he climbed out of the old four-door saloon he habitually drove. Beth clambered out of the second car, her bright smile dimming when she saw the black crow’s surrounding him.

“It’s concerning,” Hershel said as he moved to stand beside Maggie, his attention pulled to the crows, “very concerning. My contact at animal control hasn’t seen anything like it, they’re coming in the morning.” His pale eyes shifted away from the farm and towards the edge of the woods, “The Miller’s had half their flock die a week ago, no obvious ailments… it’s very concerning.” his attention returned to Daryl and he smiled, the seriousness of moments before gone. “You’ll join us for lunch? There’s plenty to spare.”

 

Though the food and the company were good, Daryl was uneasy through the meal, excusing himself early and waving Beth away when she moved to leave with him, telling her to bring the cash to the store tomorrow.

The unsettled feeling didn’t dissipate until he was back at the shop. He finished a couple of orders with his mind elsewhere and searched through some of the books he’d brought over from the Murphy house. He had no idea what he was looking for, but the action of looking soothed him a little.

When Beth came by the shop before school the next morning, he was still there, nearing the bottom of the pile of books and no closer to knowing what was happening.

Either the strange occurrences had increased, or Daryl was paying better attention. Aaron had an entire order of flour contaminated with bugs and a bad smell. Tyrese had a fresh carcass rot overnight. Dale found six dead possums at the entrance to his bar and the church discovered mould in its walls.

The incidents on their own were small, but Daryl’s sense of unease grew with each new story he heard. Most worryingly, was the presence in the woods. He could feel the unease amongst the trees and had found dead animals with no outward sign of injury but a sickness in the air around them on more than one occasion.

He searched the books left at the Murphy house and started murmuring cleansing words when he slipped between the trees and made offerings and prays each night at the altar in the backyard of his house but it felt like he was treading water, barely staying afloat as something bad slipped in and contaminated the town.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys are amazing, thank you for reading. More soon!


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the bit of a wait for this one, uni work has gotten super intense and I've managed to crawl out of the hole of it just long enough to post this chapter.  
> Though, in my opinion, this chapter is great hahaha  
> Posting may be sporadic for the next couple of weeks until uni is over, but I'll try to keep on top of this.  
> Enjoy!   
> mild warnings of gross visuals and a bit of horror.   
> Things are escalating!

“This magic stuff freaks me out,” Rick said during their afternoon tea, as Daryl worked on finishing up a tonic for Sasha. Rick continued, sounding absent as he watched Daryl work, “I lost my partner and got shot breaking up a cult and some of the stuff I saw there…” he shuddered all over “freaky stuff.” he lifted a hand to rub at his breast where the bullet had landed.

Daryl’s head came up with a jerk.

“What? You got shot by a cult?” he snapped, a coil of thorns twisted around his throat and he touched his hand to the bowl of wax in front of him, sending the dread which wrapped tight around his throat into the wax as his eyes zeroed in on the blur of shadow across Rick’s side he’d been keeping an eye on since they first met.

Rick shrugged, attention already drifting as he inspected a series of stones at his elbow.

“Yeah, real crazy bunch. Human sacrifices, the works.” he said absently.

“You got shot by a coven?” Daryl’s voice came out as a growl and he stared at Rick, energy hot in his fingertips and air buzzing around him smelling like aniseed and ammonia. All the pieces clicked into place like the closing of an intricate circle. “Take your top off.” he ordered, circling the worktable as he spoke.

“What?” Rick’s eyes went wide and his voice rose in surprise as Daryl approached. Daryl repeated the order, lifting his own hands to undo the buttons of Rick’s shirt when he got close enough.

Rick battered his hands away, but when Daryl reached for them again, ready to rip them off if he had to, Rick mumbled something and shook his head before unbuttoning his shirt under Daryl’s watchful eye.

When he pulled the panels of his shirt back, Daryl saw a twist of dark veins coming from his side. They writhed and moved like smoke across and under his skin. Daryl’s eyes traced them back to their root, pulling the side of Rick’s shirt open further to reveal the heart of the darkness.

He heard Rick mutter something, but Daryl’s attention was fixed on the knot of writhing snakes beneath the bullet wound which puckered the skin. It was so dark, and the colours so vivid Daryl was amazed no one else could see it.

Lifting a hand, Daryl placed two fingers to the centre of the knot. Rick’s skin was warm to the touch and smooth. But beneath that was a swirl of feelings, a twisting mess of intentions and cruelties. It was messy magic, but effective. The vines of poison crept through Rick’s body slowly, weighed down by its darkness and the hatred which fed it. It was a slow curse, designed to eat away at its victim. As Daryl let his awareness travel through the mess, searching for the heart of it, he wondered if it was meant to be so slow.

Bringing his attention back, Daryl turned a glare to Rick. “The hell didn’t you say you’d been cursed?” he growled.

Rick’s eyes went wide and his jaw twitched. “I ain’t cursed.” he said dismissively, stepping away from Daryl and reaching for the buttons of his shirt, starting to redo them. Daryl wanted to stop him and watched as the other man’s lean torso disappeared under the fabric, the darkness becoming indistinct once more through his shirt.

“Doesn’t matter if you believe it or not. You break up a coven of witches during a sacrifice and it ends in a gunfight? Bad feelings, man.” he scoffed and crossed his arms over his chest. “You wanna know what the vital ingredient to any spell is? Intent. If you don’t mean it, you’re just playing with flowers. And that?” he nodded to Rick’s side, “they meant that. They were pissed, they want you dead.” _or worse._ He finished in his head, unwilling to voice the thought.

Rick continued buttoning his shirt and Daryl clenched his hands into fists to stop himself reaching out and slapping his hands away.

“I know this is your religion or whatever, Daryl, but curses and spells, witches, it’s not real. Not for me.” Rick’s voice was calm and diplomatic, he sounded more like a cop than Daryl had ever heard him. It made Daryl’s teeth ache to let slew angry words. His skin prickled with the desire to prove it, to shove Rick’s condescending disbelief down his throat. Magic was faith, it was belief and willpower, it was pushing every part of himself into an intent and watching it catch alight with his spark of magic and become a blaze. Daryl pushed it aside and set his jaw, looking at the other man steadily.

“How have you been sleeping?” he asked, Rick's hands hesitated before he lowered them from the buttons, leaving the hollow of his throat bare in the v of his opened collar.

“Fine.” Rick bit out, and if Daryl hadn’t been watching him so carefully, if he hadn’t tuned into the familiar silver and gunpowder scent of him which flared hot and angry at the question, he might have believed him.

“No strange dreams?” Daryl cocked his head and lifted a hand to rest against the wound now covered by fabric. Rick went still beneath his touch, his breaths slow and steady under Daryl’s hand. Pushing his awareness into the coil of ugly intent which knotted his side, Daryl breathed through the wave of sickness which rolled his stomach before focusing on Rick. “Snakes maybe? Rot? Fire? Maggots?” As he spoke he could see it, flashes of images which rose from the darkness of his mind before being pulled back under. It was a kaleidoscope of horrors, snakes moving in a nest, slick bodies writhing around each other, tying themselves in knots and he could almost feel them under his skin. Rot bloomed on walls, eating away at the structures, a flash of fire like a shock, like breaking through the ice and not being able to catch his breath. Maggots writhed in a fresh carcass a mass of undulating, blood-covered creatures. Forcing the images back, Daryl lowered his hand to the worktable beside him, holding himself up with it and working to push the rush of foreign magic back out of his system.

Rick was pale, his eyes wide and glassy as he stared at Daryl as though he was looking for some kind of trick. The silence stretched between them, weighty and pregnant.

“You feel sick, right?” Daryl asked, “Bug you can’t shake off? Tired? You hide it well, but… there’s something not right.”

“I was a cop,” Rick said, voice a low rumble, “all cops have bad dreams.”

“Not like that.”

Rick had nothing to say to that, and instead, lowered himself back down onto his chair. Casting a glance at his discarded teacup he nudged it away and looked at Daryl, his eyes traced over his form, from scuffed boots to tousled hair. Daryl felt a flush rise up his throat at the inspection, feeling exposed.

After a moment which seemed to stretch on forever, Rick relaxed back against the worktable and nodded his head once.

“Okay,” he said.

“Okay?”  Daryl repeated, as though saying it might reveal a trick in the word. Rick’s lips curled fondly and he nodded again.

“Okay. If you think you can fix it, go ahead.”

Daryl studied him for a second. When the offer wasn’t rescinded, he set about gathering ingredients. He took one of the teacups that matched the pair they’d had their tea in and filled it part ways with water before making a circuit of the workbench, dropping in lavender oil to open his senses, clove to cleanse, aniseed for clarity and more which called out to him and he remembered from the books in the Murphy library. As the ingredients mixed together, the water became murky and unappealing. He’d never done a spell like this before, though he’d read every account there was in the books he had and had dabbled once or twice in retrieving forgotten dreams and clarifying his own intents, but he’d never actively sought out something malicious in another. Surface impressions and readings were usually enough. The people of Oak Haven were simple people, unlikely to get themselves cursed or tangled up in dark magics.

Finishing his circuit of the table he came to a stop beside Rick and held the teacup out in front of him.

"Spit." He instructed.

Rick eyed him for a moment, sharp eyes flicking between the mess of ingredients in the cup and Daryl’s impassive face before ducking his head over the cup and spitting.

Nodding, Daryl pulled the mug away and reached for the dregs of Rick’s discarded tea and poured them unceremoniously on top of the murky concoction. He reached a finger in and give it a quick stir, before knocking it back in one hit like a shot of bad liquor.

"Oh, _gross_!" Rick’s shouted and Daryl bite back a smile at the way his face had twisted up in disgust.

"Water holds memory, and I ain’t drinking your piss." Daryl said, turning towards his workbench so he didn’t laugh at the blush which was spreading across Rick’s face. "Now shut up, I need to concentrate."

 

In all the accounts Daryl had read of this and similar spells, the results were dependant on what is there to find. One Murphy had cast the spell every day for a week before she found the malignant seed a cheated wife had buried in her husband. The account had said how it was barely the size of a poppy seed and had been incidental magic brought on by high emotions and a wish, it had been small, but the feelings which had formed the seed had nearly killed the man.

Daryl hadn’t known what he was expecting when he bowed his head in meditation, clearing his mind and breathing in a deep, cleansing breath as he followed the trail of the potion deep within himself. No account he’d read had described anything which knocked into him like a physical blow.

Crumbling to his knees, Daryl bit back a cry of surprise when ice raced through his veins and a sensation like snakes slithered across his skin, as the air in his lungs became hot and wet like breathing the gas from a swamp. A rush of images raced through his mind, fire, ice, snakes, rot, mutilated cattle and gleaming black crows falling from the sky. Beneath all of it, under the heady rush of images, there was a presence which lurked, just outside his reach heavy and sticky as tar but slippery like smoke. It was the dreams in 3D, with surround sound and decay on his tongue. He gagged at the taste and squeezed his eyes shut against the onslaught of images, though that didn’t stop the assault.

Pressing the palms of his hands against the floor, Daryl pushed the excess energy down into the earth where it would be cleansed and incorporated by the core of energy which had claimed the shop. With the shock of the spell eased, Daryl could feel the breaths once more in his lungs and he could push past the taste and smell of the curse and follow the thread back to the core.

At its heart, it was a clumsy spell, poorly crafted and ill thought out, but it was strong because of the hatred behind it. Too strong to be any one caster, and that thought was a worrying one.

Daryl’s spell was short lived, but if felt like it went on for hours. When the hold he had on the curse began to slip, he knew the spell was fading and he worked to calm his body and let the magic ease out of him, taking the foulness of the curse with it, but leaving behind the impressions he’d gained.

What felt like hours later, Daryl blinked the last of the visions from his eyes and found himself kneeling, slumped over in his work room, a frantic Rick holding onto his shoulders and repeating his name in an urgent voice. He calmed slightly when Daryl blinked him into focus and opened his mouth to reassure him. Before he could, a wave of nausea rocketed through him, rushing from deep in his belly up to his mouth.

Lurching to his feet, Daryl staggered to the sink against the wall and bowed over it as he heaved. Acids and water hit the metal basin and hurt his throat on the way up. He heaved again, sweat breaking out across his skin and his body shook with shivers as he felt a rush of hot run through him, chased by a wave of bone-chilling cold. He coughed up more bile and struggled to stop when something clung to the walls of his throat, one sharp end unmoving and resistant, pricking into the soft flesh when he tried to swallow the sensation away.

Pressing his fingers into his mouth, he tasted the salt of his own sweat barely cutting through the taste of bile that coated his mouth as his knuckles knocked against his teeth. He gagged around his fingers before he felt the foreign object that was causing him trouble and he squeezed his eyes shut as he worked it out of his throat enough for him to grip it between his fingertips and pull it out of his mouth with a sickening slide from his throat which made him gag again. Coughing wetly, Daryl caught his breath before opening his eyes and looking at what he held in his hand, though he knew by the feel what he’d see.

Wet and slightly crushed, the feather didn't look like much. It was a deep, glimmering black, and as he absently straightened out the fibres which were clumping together and twisted against the stem, Daryl knew it’d be neat and elegant, a wing feather from a large black bird, probably a crow.

Dropping it to the bottom of the sink, Daryl turned the tap on and dunked his head under the water, gasping at the cool shock of it before pulling back and taking deep, satisfying mouthfuls until his thirst eased a little and he could spare some to swish around his mouth and spit out, ignoring the feather in the bottom of the sink which seemed so innocuous, twisted and pathetic under the torrent of water.

“The hell was that, Daryl?” Rick demanded behind him, his voice low.

“That’s what’s in you.” Daryl said, his voice coming out raw and abused.

His eyes strayed to the shadow on Rick’s side as though magnetized to the spot, though he had to fight not to recoil at it. He could still feel the ugliness of the curse clinging to him like the tar of the lurking presence of the curse. Now that he had some distance, he realised it was also the feeling of something off around town.

He turned a curious eye towards the other man, taking in his wide eyes and the way his hair looked wild, like he’d repeatedly ran his fingers through it, messing up the usual restrained curls. He’d never heard of an individual curse growing beyond the recipient and affecting an entire town, but the memory of that pull which had propelled him towards the Grimes ‘s residence and the sensation of darkness he’d experienced there, along with the disturbances in town could all be linked and had all happened after Rick and his family moved to Oak Haven.

 

Rick wouldn’t let him move from the chair he’d staggered into until the colour had returned to his features and he was no longer shivering as though he had a fever. Daryl wanted to be annoyed by the way the older man hovered at his side and made him tea which was too bitter and too sweet, but which he drank anyway.

When it no longer felt like his insides had been replaced by a pit of snakes and the taste of bile in his throat was washed away by sweet, poorly brewed tea, Daryl stood up. Waving Rick’s protests away, he got to his feet and cast a look around the workshop.

Magic is elemental. It’s born of the earth and exists at the whims of nature. Daryl had read enough books on magic and the history of witchcraft to see that people struggled to see it that way. Witches wanted to harness and control the spark within them, as though doing so would unlock some more primal understanding of the universe. He’d watched his grandmother occasionally work against the will of the ingredients in her potions or tonics, and it was years before Daryl realised she didn’t see it like he did. That the wild, untameable and temperamental nature of magic didn’t make sense and feel _right_ for her like it did for him.

Standing in his workshop, he tried to dissect what he’d learned of the curse on Rick. Every action had an equal opposite reaction, it was just a matter of figuring out what was feeding the curse and why it was behaving the way it was.

Reaching for his mortar and pestle, he set to work creating a basic healing balm he’d use as a neutral base which he’d build off, tailoring it to Rick and the curse which writhed under his skin.

“So if I’m… cursed, what exactly does that mean?” Rick asked sometime later. When Daryl glanced up at him, he was watching Daryl work.

“It means someone’s putting a lot of energy into hurting you,” frowning, Daryl looked down at the greyish paste he was working, “too much energy.”

The side effects of the curse which had been spreading through the town were large and dangerous, no small, heat-of-the-moment curse or clumsy spell could create an effect like that. Most magic faded over time unless it had something feeding it, a building like the shop or the woods, where the very earth nurtured its innate magic. Curses and spells didn’t grow and mutate like this one had, it wasn’t how it worked. He flicked a glance at Rick, taking in the stubborn line of his strong jaw and the aura of strength and resilience he gave off, even dragged down as he was by the curse.

An unsettling thought slipped to the surface of Daryl’s mind and he found his eyes drawn to the shadow on the other man’s chest. It was possible Rick’s own force of will was pushing the worst of the sickness out, and that was affecting the rest of the town. It would explain how, for all its viciousness, Rick was still standing and relatively strong, not crippled or dead like he should be.

“And that means...?” Rick asked, when Daryl had been quiet for too long. Daryl blinked at him and shook his head to clear it before returning his focus to his work.

“What you send out into the world comes back to you, threefold,” he explained, looking towards the other man who was watching him avidly, “whenever you make or cast... it takes a bit of you, that’s how it works.”

“So why do you make things for the whole town?” Rick asked, cocking his head, “Why do you put yourself out there?”

Daryl shrugged. “I can help.”

“Even with the way they treat you?”

Daryl looked away. He felt a flush prickle on the back of his neck and ears. He was unexpectedly disappointed to have Rick know how the town saw him. Rick might not have grown up in Oak Haven, might not have been there that long, but the town didn’t hide their unease about Daryl or their contempt for Dixons. There should never be a question that he knew how it was.

Rick had tea with Daryl most days and had never shown the same suspicion and wariness the rest of the town had. Daryl hadn’t realised that he'd hoped Rick hadn’t known about it. That maybe Rick had seen Daryl as _normal_ or some variant of it at least.

“I can help, and it don’t hurt me to do it.” Daryl said at last. “The magic won’t work if they didn’t trust me a little.” His eyes flicked up to the other man and met the pale blue eyes that were focused on him. Rick’s face was serious, but there was a softness around his clever eyes which made Daryl duck his head.

Daryl was still working when Rick left to pick up his son from school. When Beth arrived, she watched him work silently, taking in the increasingly elaborate preparations. Most of what Daryl made for the people of Oak Haven didn’t need much work, occasionally a lunar cycle or a series of prayers at specific times, but most were fairly straight forward.

When she left that night, Daryl was still working.

He spent most of the night on it. Around two in the morning he closed himself into the room at the back of the shop with a collection of stones and focused their energies, channelling their strengths into the core of them in preparation, before calling it a night and collapsing onto the couch and sleeping deeply.

His dreams were strange, still linked with the magic brewing around him and the shape of the curse affecting the town. He tumbled through hazy images and impressions, swept along by the familiar currents of the shops energy like a rudderless ship caught in the waves of an ocean which stretched out in all directions towards a colourless sky.

He woke up struggling for breath, with heavy limbs but deeply rested. The familiar couch was comfortable and he let the pillows take his weight as his mind slowly followed his body into consciousness.

When a delivery van rattled down the street outside, Daryl pulled himself off the couch with a groan and surveyed the mess occupying his workbench. Rick had said he’d be back around noon, so he had half an hour to do the final preparations of the spell.

He’d decided the night before that he’d perform it in the small back room, using the energy of the shop to amplify the healing and cleansing qualities of the spell; and to needle out the curse in case of a continued link to the caster, which Daryl suspected. He wasn't sure, but he figured the boost of natural magic to his own would be enough the break that connection entirely.

When he placed the last of the stones he’d prepared the night before in a circle taking up the floor surface of the small room, along with five bowls, each containing a symbolic token of an element, he emerged into the cooler air of his workshop and found Rick on the couch, flipping through one of the books from the Murphy library.

Rick looked up when he heard Daryl enter and the two men stared at each other for a moment. Daryl took a watery brown tonic he often used to channel energies and crossed the room to hand it to the other man.

“Drink this and take off your shirt,” he ordered, turning away and picking up the paste he'd made the day before, now with a reddish hue to the grey mixture from deer blood and ochre. Glancing at Rick, he saw the dubious look he was giving the tonic. Feeling Daryl’s eyes on him, Rick heaved a sigh and downed the drink in one go, his face scrunching up in anticipated distaste before shifting into confusion when he found the flavour slightly grassy but otherwise flavourless.

“Shirt.” Daryl reminded when it looked like Rick wasn’t going to move.

Rick huffed but did as he was told, holding still when Daryl squatted down in front of him and spread the paste across his lean chest in swirling lines which formed a series of runes across his sternum.

The paste was cool and lumpy. Rick shuddered at the sensation but remained silent and docile, sharp eyes fixed on Daryl.

Satisfied with the runes, Daryl stood up, smearing the remains of the paste across his own cheekbones and down his throat as he nodded towards the back room.

Rick followed slowly, peering into the room from the threshold and taking in the flickering candlelight and marks across the floor and walls. Daryl let him look, his own eyes taking in the familiar space. He wondered how it looked to other people, if the runes and blessings made sense or were just a mess of lines and shapes, if it was something beautiful to them, like it was to Daryl.

When it looked like Rick had finished his inspection and wasn’t about to bolt from the building, Daryl nodded to the centre of the circle which dominated the ground.

“Lay down, head pointing that way.” he instructed. Rick did as he was told and when he was flat on the ground, Daryl made a slow circuit of the other man, repositioning his hands so they lay flat along his side, palms up, and his booted feet so they rested together, toes towards the ceiling.

Daryl hesitated over the next part of the spell, lifting his hand to his mouth, he chewed on his thumb nail as he considered how best to go about it.

Touch wasn't a large part of Daryl’s life. After his mom died, his grandmother was the only person who touched him easily. Merle would sling an arm over his shoulder, jostle him or wrestle him into a headlock sometimes, but never gently or simply just to touch. It wasn’t how Dixon’s were.

People didn’t touch Daryl, not casually, not accidentally, not even to shake hands. As though whatever made Daryl wrong and different was somehow catching, like he could curse them or bewitch them through touch alone. Rick and Beth were the only people besides Merle who didn’t actively avoid physical contact with him. It had never bothered Daryl before, but as he looked down at Rick, lying trustingly in Daryl’s inner sanctuary, he suddenly felt at a disadvantage and at a loss how to initiate the contact required for the spell.

Rick shifted restlessly, his eyes drifting to Daryl from where they’d been studying the marks on the walls. Daryl pulled his thumbnail from his mouth and clenched his fist, setting his jaw as though readying himself for a fight.

Rick’s eyebrows shot up when Daryl stepped one leg over him, nudging his arms aside to fit his feet. Daryl felt a hot blush creeping up his neck and boiling across his cheeks as he lowered himself down to kneel over the other man, his ass resting on Rick’s pelvis and his hands coming to rest, spread fingered, over Rick’s chest, bracketing the runes he’d painted there.

Rick’s eyebrows were still high on his forehead and his lips had twisted into amused surprise. Daryl scowled down at him.

“Shut up.” he grumbled and felt the laughter move Rick’s chest under his hands.

Daryl stared at where they were joined for a second, startled by the intimacy of it. He shot a darting look up at Rick’s face, quickly looking away from the small smile and crinkles around his eyes as he looked up at Daryl.

“Close your eyes and concentrate on breathing,” Daryl told him, “try and clear your mind.” When he saw Rick close his eyes as he was told, Daryl closed his own.

Rolling his head from side to side to stretch out his neck, Daryl felt his body shift into the meditative state he needed, his breathing growing slow and deep as his awareness expanded out from his body and the magic of the shop wrapped around him like a cocoon. Rick’s breaths fell in sync with his, his strong chest rising and falling beneath Daryl’s hands as the energies moved around them and connecting them.

Daryl had never understood the spectacle and particular wording of spells that were shown in movies. He understood the chanting and rhythmic calls and use of drums some faiths used, amplifying and channelling the beat of nature and the spirit worlds. But that was different magic to the stuff which coursed through his veins, that was primal, the threshold between life and death, the connection with the spirit world. The magic of the Murphy’s was elemental, it didn't need to call on spirits or gods, didn't need to be crafted and controlled with words, it rode on the winds back, existed in the flicker of a flame and pulsed with the deep, pure magic of the earth. In the small, hot room sweat prickled across their skin and Daryl felt himself move with the rhythm of the shops energy, rocking in time with the noise which thrummed in his body and his head fell back as it accepted him completely and his magic enveloped him.

The body beneath him ceased to be a man and was instead, a vessel of energies. A life made up of imprints and sparks, elemental magic in its most base sense. The flush of love with the shock of birth, energy, joy, adventure. The awe of creating life and cradling the love which made it in his arms, the horror of violence, the strength of his will, grief, sadness and joy, hunger and isolation, family and silver to his core, all mixing together to form the history of Rick Grimes. He could unmake this man, remove whole parts of him, recreate him like reworking clay.

It was heady, Daryl felt his breathing become laboured and his hands shifted against the skin beneath his hands, electricity where their skin touched and he wanted to rub against it, to drown himself in the other man. His mouth parted around half-formed sounds and he squeezed his eyes shut as he tried to push beyond the thrilling sense of connection and the draw of the other man's essence.

The curse was like a tumour. it recoiled at Daryl’s touch before it surged, angry with a foreign energy. Daryl inspected it, eased it away from Rick, though it clung to him as though with barbed tendrils. He frowned as he studied it and found six separate wills creating it, feeding it. One surged suddenly, a hot pulse of ugly magic which ran across Daryl’s skin feeling wrong and diseased. The air in the room grew thick and Daryl felt the presence pushing against the barrier of the protective circle around them trying to find a gap to slip through.

The surge of power climaxed with a sick pop and the room around them pulsed with energy. The flames of the candles soared, turning blue and he heard a crack echo around the space.

Daryl pulled back from Rick, gasping in a breath which burned his lungs. His head was spinning and his hands shook as he turned bleary eyes around the room to where the candles still burned blue, his eyes moved around the circle, taking in three of the stones around them which were now an oily black, cracked through. The old, gentle magic of them ruined and burned up by what they’d kept at bay.

Beneath him, Rick moved as he took in the room, watching as the blue flames died down and returned to their usual warm gold. Daryl watched as well, a candle’s flame only turned blue when a spirit was in the room. With the sudden surge of energy through the curse and the abrupt, unpleasant pop he’d felt, he knew the chill that ran through him was entirely separate to the curse which still lingered. Someone had died to keep Rick cursed, they’d given their energy to the spell completely.

“Woah,” Rick said, his head falling back against the floor.  

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You Kudos and Commenters are just wonderful and I'm crazy happy that people are liking this weird little fic.  
> You guys are great!


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so sorry about the late update! End of Term has been kicking my arse.  
> Also, note that I've changed it from 9 chapters to 10. I got caught up in a scene which was meant to be a small one so I decided to make it three normal sized chapters instead of two MASSIVE ones. 
> 
> Thanks so much for all the kudos and comments! They mean the world to me and kept me from not forgetting about this entirely during all my assignments.  
> (for the commenter who said it has a "Practical Magic" vibe, that's hilarious because this story was spawned while I watched it and I started it seconds after I finished the movie.)
> 
> Enjoy!

Rick had left after the spell. Daryl spent the rest of the afternoon trying to forget the feeling of a life forfeited for a terrible cause.

Beth was already telling a story about something that had happened earlier that day, when she pushed passed the curtain into the workshop. She trailed off when Daryl didn’t react to her, his gaze distant as his hands cupped a smoky, ruined quartz he’d brought with him from the back room.

“Are you okay?” she asked, drawing his eyes towards her.

Dropping the quartz onto the table, Daryl rubbed his hands together to dispel the feeling that lingered.

“You ever scared of what I do?” he asked her. Beth’s eyes went wide and she cocked her head at him as she lowered her backpack to the table.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean all of this,” he waved a hand to take in the room and the debris of his spell for Rick, “you’re a devout little choir-girl, god-fearing and raised well. Does what I do frighten you? Spells and tonics and hex-bags?” he asked.

Folding her arms across her chest, Beth leant her weight against the table and considered him. “Sometimes,” she said at last, “but I know you, Daryl. Every time I see something that scares me, or when someone says how strange what you do is, I remind myself that I know you and I know what a good person you are.

“You’re the man that pulled me out of a frozen lake and who cares about the wellbeing of every person in this town, despite what they say about you. You have never hurt anyone, and sometimes, what you do is so beautiful and wonderful I can barely believe it.” her eyes followed him as he stood up and crossed to the kitchen area, “What’s this about?” she asked softly.

Daryl ignored her, his attention on his hands as he went through the motions of making tea.

“Did Rick say something?” she asked, “You had lunch with him, right? Eric said you guys have lunch together most days.”

“You need to stop gossiping with Eric.”

“We weren't gossiping!” at the dry look he shot her, she let out a laugh and accepted the mug he handed her.

She sat at the workbench with her mug as Daryl began cleaning up the remains of the spell. He could feel her eyes following him as he worked.

“What are your lunches like, anyway?” she asked. When Daryl glanced at her, she was running a finger absently over the tabletop not looking at him.

“They’re not lunches, he just stops by for a drink.” Daryl said as he brushed salt off his palms and looked around the room. He didn’t know why, but the action brought to mind the feeling of Rick under him, his strong, broad chest warm under Daryl’s rough hands.

He’d never touched someone like that before, never sat atop them and been allowed free reign over their form. When he’d still been in school he’d thought about it sometimes, when a pretty cheerleader or a kid in class caught his eye, but it never went beyond idle curiosity. He’d never felt curious enough to try and had known his position as a Dixon and the town freak wouldn’t have helped him.

A warm flush crept up his throat and settled in his cheeks as a flare of heat curled through his stomach, like the heat of the small, close room which had wrapped around their forms as Daryl’s senses saw more than he ever had before, exposing Rick to Daryl in the most intimate, primal way.

Daryl turned away from Beth and focused on cleaning the bowls he’d used, turning on the tap so the rush of the water made further conversation difficult. He wasn’t sure, but he thinks Beth laughed softly into her mug.

 

Beth was quiet and more courteous than usual for the rest of the afternoon. Her expressive face showed that she was worried, though she had no idea what she should be worried about.

When the workshop and backroom were back to their usual chaotic order and any sign of the failed spell was replaced with the orders Daryl had set aside the day before to focus his attention on Rick, Daryl was finally able to shoo Beth home.

But Daryl found her absence didn’t make it easier to focus. The quiet shop kept whispering and humming in thought, working its way through the energy left over from the spell and processing what happened. Daryl found his own mind occupied with sense memories of everything that had happened, the oil-slick presence, the pop of a life ended and the writhing, thorned snakes which clung to Rick’s lifeforce.

It was nearly six when Daryl swung his leg over Merle’s motorbike and pointed it towards the old Curtis house, now occupied by the Grimes family.

 

There was a sense of life in the residential street at this time of night. It was a world Daryl had never lived in, but had seen on tv and voyeuristically out of his grandmother's window, and the passenger seat of his brothers old Ford truck when Daryl was still in school. Back when they’d drive around town and into the neighbouring areas most nights, with no purpose or need beyond staying out of their dad’s hair.

The houses seemed to thrum with life as families gathered together to eat and talk about their days. Children’s laughter and the twang of a bouncing ball in someone’s drive floated through the evening air from somewhere. Daryl slowed as he moved down the street, shutting off the roar of the engine to wheel the bike along the road, soaking in the warm, buzzing sense of life and family which filled the tree-lined street. His grandmother used to talk about the power of community, it’s why she went to church, why she comforted those that came to her and why she, and her family before her, could never leave the small town they called home.

Climbing the two steps onto Rick’s front porch, Daryl cast a look around the neighbourhood, breathing deeply as though to fill his lungs with the lemonade-air which buzzed in the warm evening twilight. He raised his fist and knocking sharply on the front door before he could talk himself out of it.

As he waited, he eyed the new, unpainted wood around the door and the bright new lock which were the only signs that showed he’d been there before. His staring contest was broken when the door opened with a jerk and his eyes darted up to meet the wide, surprised eyes of a teenager.

“ _Carl! What have I told you?_ ” Rick’s voice came from within, soon followed by the man himself, his attention on the fussy child in his arms.

Carl’s expression shifted to one Daryl had seen on Beth’s face when she thought Maggie or her dad were treating her like a kid.

“I thought it was the pizza.” he huffed, letting go of his hold on the door to turn part-way towards his dad, but his eyes remained on Daryl.

As though only that moment realising that the door was open and Daryl was in the doorway, Rick looked at him and a smile spread across his face, “Daryl,” he said, shifting his daughter on his hip who was pulling enthusiastically at his curls. “What’re you doing here?”

Daryl shifted where he stood, shooting a glance towards his bike at the curb, as though he might make a run for it.

“I can come another time… Or it can wait. I was wondering how you were, if you were alright.” Daryl felt the words tumbling out of his mouth and gritted his teeth to stop them.

Rick’s smile went fond, and as he reached up to untangle his daughter's fingers from his hair he nodded for Daryl to come in.

“I’m alright.” he said, eyes darting towards Carl who stood between them, watching their conversation like a tennis match.

Rick gestured for Carl to step aside and the teenager did after another lingering assessment of Daryl. Daryl held still and only moved when Carl had stepped aside, seemingly losing interest in the situation and turned back down the hallway. Rick watched his sons retreating back and shot Daryl a look as he waved him into the house and reached behind him to close the front door.

Daryl shifted aside to make room and found himself suddenly pressed between the wall and Rick. A tight, buzzing sensation took up residence in his chest as he got a whiff of Rick’s natural small, now with the faint undertone of incense and the earthy balm he hadn’t washed off completely and a spark of Daryl’s own magic lingering on his skin.

Daryl ducked his head and hid his blush under his fringe and waited for Rick to lead them into the house.

The old Curtis house was a small, dim house, more modern than a lot of the houses in Oak Haven, built sometime in the sixties, boxy, square and modern for the time. Daryl hadn’t had the time or inclination to poke around the last, and only, time he’d been here before.

Rick lead him into a cosy living room, a TV on one wall and the room dominated by a soft couch and a worn-in recliner. A fireplace, now hosting a grilled electric fire, had a thick wooden mantelpiece jutting out from the brick chimney.

The mantle was lined with photos in frames and children's creations. The room buzzed with family and Daryl looked around it curiously as Rick bounced Judith in his arms. He looked pale, the curse showing more clearly on him than it ever had before. He looked worn out, and Daryl’s stomach twisted at the sight of it.

“You okay?” he asked. Rick looked at him, his blue eyes hooded and not as focused or intent as usual. He looked away from Daryl and focused on the girl in his arms as he fiddled needlessly with her dress.

“Shaken up.” he said at last, returning his eyes to Daryl. “That was some scary shit.” he huffed a laugh “I’m exhausted for some reason.”

Daryl nodded, “I shoulda brought you some tea, rejuvenate you. The spell took a lot of energy.” Daryl said, making a mental note to mix him up some tea, he could head back to the shop and have it done and ready for him in an hour or two. The last thing Rick needed with that curse was to feel drained. His mental preparations were interrupted by Rick.

“How’re you? Are you okay?” Rick asked in a low, gentle voice, sounding like he was honestly concerned. Daryl blinked at him. He was drained too, wired from the rush of it and sick to his stomach with the remembered sensation of the curse, and a little shaken with the power of the spell. He frowned, trying to find a way to voice that.

“I ain’t done a spell like that before.” he said eventually, flicking his eyes up to meet Rick’s.

Rick took a step closer, but whatever he was going to say was interrupted by the cheerful rap of knuckles against the front door. Rick’s head snapped towards the direction.

“That’ll be the pizza.” he said as Carls footsteps bounded into the hall. Rick rolled his eyes and passed Judith to Daryl as he dashed out the room with a call to his son

“ _Carl! What have I said?”_

_“It’s Glenn, dad. Not some crazy junkie.”_

Daryl listened to father and son squabble as they opened the door and greet the man on the other side. He looked down at the small girl in his arms and fumbled to hold her more securely. She let out a gurgle and smiled up at him, her smile spreading across her chubby, soft face as she wriggled in his hold.

Rocking her gently, Daryl moved around the room, inspecting it curiously. Coming to a stop at the mantle his eyes trailed over the collection of photos and trinkets, his attention caught by a pretty brunette woman in a silver frame. He studied it closely as he bounced Judith, making her laugh.

“My wife, Lori.” Rick said from the doorway. Daryl swung around to face him, cocking his ear to hear Carl in the kitchen banging cupboards as a car started up outside and drove away.

“She passed away giving birth.” Rick continued, his eyes flicked to Judith and Daryl’s eyes followed his, to the bright bundle of energy in his arms. She smiled up at him and reached to tug on his hair.

Doing the math, Daryl felt a knot build in his throat as he considered the small, happy baby. She was born after Rick was shot.

Daryl’s eyes were drawn towards the blur of the curse on Rick’s chest as though magnetised, and he remembered the way it twisted and writhed beneath his skin. How it had leaked out of the older man, a monster built from the energy funnelled into him which he’d been fighting off since the curse took effect.

A wave of sadness and sickness moved through him, leaving a chill which was at odds with the warm evening. Rick’s wife couldn’t have fought off something like that in childbirth. It’s a time of defencelessness, all energy and power a woman possessed channelled into birthing a new life. A sacred time, a moment of pure magic which everyone could witness.

Studying the small life in his arms, Daryl felt the threads of love and protection which were bound so tightly around her, how strong those protective threads were.

A mother’s last gift, before a curse took her. She would have instinctively poured every ounce of strength and innate power she had into the new life without even knowing it. A primitive instinct of a mother to protect their young from something awful.

“Have dinner with us.” Rick said, then turned and left the room before Daryl could refuse. Sharing a look with Judith, Daryl followed the older man into the kitchen.

 

Daryl didn’t eat much. He spent most of the meal watching Carl and Rick talk as Rick alternated feeding himself and spooning baby food into his daughter’s mouth.

Daryl watched the comfortable routines of a family as he sipped at the beer Rick had given him. Rick would occasionally draw him into his conversation with his son or Judith would catch sight of him and gurgle happily, making Rick huff as he wiped her face and hands clean. It was a glimpse into a foreign world and Daryl felt like a tourist who had wandered into an exotic, new land.

When Carl collected the plates and cups as Rick threw out the pizza boxes, Daryl clutched at his beer and pretended not to see Judith reaching for him with chubby fingers.

Rick busied himself with his daughter as Carl retreated to his room, and Daryl took the moment to slip out the door to the backyard, patting his pockets for his cigarettes as he closed the door softly behind him.

The backyard was alive with the sound of the slowly descending night and Daryl breathed the familiar smells deeply. The added smell of cut grass and sun-warmed houses was a novel, and not unwelcome, addition to the welcoming scent he’d known all his life.

There was no street like this to his house on the edge of the woods. Dixons lived isolated from the rest of town and were more a part of nature than civilisation. This street was also different to the Murphy house, which was on the outskirts of town and was a big, old house with a large yard which separated it from its neighbours; more than the small patch of grass and disinterested lemon tree of Rick’s home ever could.

Lighting a cigarette, Daryl contemplated the evening sky, listening to the thrum of the community and the deep pulse of the town. Ignoring, for the moment, the off-0key of discord which was seeping through.

The backdoor opened with a creak of wood and Daryl glanced behind him to see Rick emerge with two beer bottles in hand.

“I need to know more about the curse.” Daryl said, nodding his thanks for the beer. Rick glanced back at the house then over towards the neighbour’s house on the left, with one quick assessing glance he likely wasn't aware of making, before studying his beer.

“The cult?” he asked, voice coolly disinterested. Daryl nodded.

“It ended with a shootout?”

“Yeah,” Rick murmured, “the whole thing was a mess. People going everywhere, hostages panicking, returned fire. It was weird. The leader just didn’t care, I saw him just walking through the chaos, laughing,  like he was enjoying it.” a frown crept across Rick’s sharp features and his voice was soft and low. Daryl got a fleeting impression of gunpowder, adrenaline, sweat and blood and grief. He swallowed against the feelings, remembering what Rick had said the day before, that he’d lost his partner that day. Pushing that aside, he pressed for more.

“Did he chant or say something to you? Did he show particular interest in you?”

Rick shrugged one shoulder. “He was the one that shot me,” his eyes moved up to meet Daryl’s and they were shadowed and dark. “I don't remember him saying or doing anything, I don’t remember much.” his tone shifted at the end, weighed down by a history Daryl could only guess at, tainted with frustration, pain and grief.

Daryl latched onto the small detail offered. The leader would have been the only person in the coven who could draw on, and entwine, the other members in a spell as big as the one cast on Rick. If he was also the shooter, he was almost definitely the caster, their fates entwined with an act of violence, tied together by blood and the power imbalance of that moment.

"What happened to him?” Daryl asked, his fingers slipping on the condensation of his bottle, trying not to look like Rick was holding the puzzle piece he needed. Rick shrugged.

“Got arrested. He’s in the State Pen now.” he said. Daryl’s fingers tingled. The State Pen, where Merle was.

“He got a name?”

Rick laughed, a huff of breath which conveyed derision and anger. “Yeah, Negan. No last name, no history.” he breathed the same huff of laughter and shook his head, looking away from Daryl. “Fucking cult bullshit.”

Conversation drifted from there, and Daryl let it. Under his skin, plans and possibilities unravelled and Daryl picked at them as he listened to Rick talk. He turned the possibilities over in his mind until what he needed to do was clear in his mind's eye and he could taste anticipation like pepper on his tongue. His blood hummed to get to work and get a jump on the ugliness which was infecting his town and slowly, painfully killing the man in front of him.

At ten, Rick glanced at his watch in surprise and began his evening tasks of closing down the house, an apologetic look on his face as Daryl excused himself.

 

Daryl returned to the shop, the roar of his bike loud in the night. Closing himself into the workshop, he waited for the morning to come as he set about making a tea mix and a tonic to help Rick regain his strength.

He was on the phone the moment the lines opened but still endured a long wait, broken periodically by prompts to repeat the prisoner details he wished to speak to. He poked at waiting orders and shuffled the ingredients scattered across his table as he waited, unable to offer anything productive as the litany of rules and protocol played on a loop in a tinny, unemotional voice in his ear.

When Merle’s gruff voice came over the line, Daryl straightened up with a jerk and dropped the piece of chalk onto the tabletop and turned away, half-finished task forgotten.

“You alright Daryl?” Merle asked before Daryl could say anything more than a greeting. His voice was rough and low, a growl under the surface and so completely his brother.

Daryl felt himself relax against the table and let himself enjoy talking to his brother. Merle cleared his throat, interrupting Daryl as he talked about the leaky pipe in the kitchen he’d fixed.

“This is all very nice, but why the fuck are you calling me, baby brother?” Merle asked. Daryl turned towards the wall, as though to keep the conversation private, though there was no one there to hear it.

“I need to know about a guy in there.” he said quietly, “a guy called Negan?”

“The fuck you wanting to know ‘bout him for?” Merle snapped back in a low, rumbling growl which struggled to make it over the phone line. Daryl felt like the breath had been punched out of him, though he didn't know if it was relief or fear.

“So he’s there?” Daryl asked breathlessly.

“Yeah,” Merle said, his voice more casual now, though still low, “a big, slick fucker. Why?”

“Does he have any followers in there?” Daryl asked. There was a silence over the line and he imagined Merle checking over his shoulder for anyone listening.

“What are you asking me, Daryl?” he asked after a long pause. Daryl took a deep breath in and licked his dry lips before talking, waiting for a slap across the back of his head from his brother he knew couldn’t come.

“He led a coven,” he said, his voice coming out strong and steady, “from what I hear it was dark magic.”

“He has a couple of followers, real close buddies.” Mere said after a moment's silence, “he has a lot of friends here.”

“Friendly guy?”

“Frightening.” Merle’s voice was a rumble over the line and Daryl felt his gut twist with worry. Merle could look after himself, he was tough and mean and clever, but Daryl could still feel the curse under his fingertips, could still see the way it ate away at Rick. “How sure are you that he’s into all that?” Merle asked.

“His coven was arrested during a sacrificial offering.”

Merle let out a low whistle before breathing a curse. They didn’t talk about magic often, and rarely openly. Daryl wasn’t ever sure how much Merle understood about it and how much he just accepted as a quirk of Daryl’s personality.

“What do you need from me?” Merle asked and Daryl could feel the familial loyalties, the ties which bind them so strongly together, forged from their mother’s blood, their own scars and a lifetime of Daryl looking up to his big brother.

“I need something that belongs to him.” Daryl said, cupping the phone against his cheek as he let the table take his weight. “Something personal, hair or a prized possession, something that holds his essence.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“Be careful.” Daryl said, pushing his will into it so it became a blessing.

“Shut the fuck up, kid.” Merle grumbled, letting out a laugh which Daryl echoed.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for all the comments and kudos!


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys, life is so hectic right now, but I haven't forgotten about you!  
> Thanks everyone who is reading and liking this! It's almost over!

Daryl would never get used to the prison visiting rooms. He rarely visited Merle, neither of them wanted it and the two-hour trip each way would have discouraged Daryl even if he had felt inclined. Neither brother liked to think too much about the time Merle spent locked up, it was a gap in their lives, something they push through before they could resume life as normal.

Merle was different when Daryl was around. Most people wouldn’t be able to notice it, or wouldn’t understand the nuance of the change if they did, but Daryl got it. Without Daryl to watch his back, Merle had to watch his own and he became more ruthless to compensate. Daryl was a steadying presence, an anchor which pulled Merle back from the edge, back from becoming the man he could have been, more like their dad, rotten to the core and dangerous to be around. In prison, that was amplified, like he fed of the chaos energy of the place and became him at his worst, or his best.

Sitting on the hard-plastic chair, Daryl meditated, trying to untangle the mess of energies around him which made him dizzy. The energy of the place was polluted. Caged in and amplified by the metal and concrete which make the structure. The history of anger, pain and death sticking like tar in the air and Daryl felt light-headed with the onslaught.

He felt Merle enter the room like a breath of fresh air, the scent of the woods behind their house faint but still there, so deeply engrained into Merle’s core he could never wash it out.

Daryl watched his brother as he was lead into the room, taking the time to study him as he said something to the guard, who rolled his eyes but otherwise didn’t react to Merle’s bared-teeth grin. Turning from the guard, Merle made a bee-line to Daryl, weaving between the tables, nodding once or twice to another prisoner as he passed.

Neither of them said anything when Merle sat, scraping the legs of the chair against the concrete ground. The two bothers looked at each other, Merle’s eyes coolly assessing. He let out a snort at the length of Daryl’s hair, but made no comment.

Merle looked comfortable in his prison overalls, the harsh fabric didn’t suit him, but it sat comfortably on his large frame and he moved in it like he was born between these haunted walls.

With a subtle glance around, Merle took in the guards around the room and the people on the tables surrounding them. He gauged their interest before sliding something across the table with enough force for it to land in Daryl’s lap, barely a flash of movement across the tabletop and not a soul in the room noticing.

Daryl caught the projectile and gave it a quick glance as he concealed it in his palm. It was a man’s heavy, silver bracelet, the silver worn soft and deep with age and wear. It was something which would easily get misplaced or stolen in a place like this, too many criminals to find the right one, unless they were stupid and outted themselves.

Daryl ran a thumb down the line of interlocking chains and shivered with the feel of the witch it belonged to. It wasn’t a treasured possession, but comfortably familiar to him, worn smooth by him. Daryl didn’t want to know how Merle managed to get something like this, not only a possession, but a silver one which had soaked up the other man’s essence over years, had witnessed his spells and the rawness of his power.

Darting a glance up at his brother, Daryl nodded his approval. Though they never talked about it, he sometimes couldn’t deny that some of his knowledge had crept into his brother, it had to have, that and an innate connection to their family’s magic. Merle may never be a witch like their grandma or Daryl, not even like their mom who mostly gave it up and lived without it, but it was in there, guiding his hand whether he knew it or not.

Daryl could almost taste the magic in the silver, distinctly Negan’s. A strangely pungent magic which sat heavy and thick, slow like treacle but as sharp as a blade. He’d never met the man, but he was intimately familiar with his magic. This soft, aged tang of the magic in the chain was different to the dark, cruelly intent poison Daryl had found buried in Rick’s chest, but it still felt the same in the back of his throat and Daryl felt like he could pick this thread of magic out of any spell, no matter how many casters there were.

He’d never known another witch outside his family. A part of him was curious, fascinated with the way Negan’s magic reacted to Daryl’s own. The way he could feel every trace of the man’s life in his power and wondered of it was the same with every witch.

Negan had built a coven around him, brought together a group of people with the spark inside them and together they had made a bonfire. Though the magic they cast was black and putrid with the wrongness of what they wanted, Daryl found his mind straying to thoughts of what that would be like, to be surrounded by those like him and not be the freak for following the nudge of magic within him, for seeing and knowing things nobody else could.

It was a childish dream he’d thought he’d given up on when he was a child, when he first realised he wasn’t like the other kids in Oak Haven, but perhaps he’d been wrong and the desire to be like others had never really gone away.

“You look like shit, baby brother.” Merle said, his pale eyes keenly dissecting him with one sweeping glance before pinning him to his uncomfortable chair, refusing to look away.

Daryl shrugged one shoulder and sunk lower into his chair, his eyes roving around the room to take in the inmates and their visitors.

Beside them, a pregnant woman was calling a man with a shaved head and a neck tattoo _baby_ as her lips trembled. Daryl flicked his eyes away when he saw the impression of another man on her and the raw, aching desperation the inmate felt when he saw her. A bone-deep feeling that she was what he was surviving for, the only thing that pushed him to stay alive each night.

On the other side of them, a hard-featured woman sat across from her son. Her disappointment and shame was metallic and sharp in Daryl’s nose. Her son worked to hide the bruises under his clothes and Daryl’s heart ached because he knew, somehow, deep in his core, that the young man had been hiding his bruises since long before he was incarcerated. A victim of systematic abuse by those around him that he was too ashamed to admit to, and she was too proud to notice.

Daryl’s head ached and his magic throbbed under his skin, pushing against the barrier of his flesh. Lifting a hand, he pinched the bridge of his nose and returned his gaze to his brother, clinging to the whisper of the woods and the thread of family he found there. He hated places like this.

“I’m fine,” he said, meeting Merle’s steady gaze, “Just been working a lot.”

Merle sucked in a breath through his teeth in a whistle and shook his head.

“You gotta be more careful,” he growled. Daryl knew if they weren’t being watched by guards, Merle would reach over and smack the back of his head. His worry over the towns reaction to Daryl’s magic was still prominent and Daryl knew his mind would be conjuring ideas of whatever stupid stunts Daryl could be doing to get himself lynched.

“I am,” Daryl huffed, crossing his arms over his chest and kicking the sole of his boot against the concrete floor. “This one jobs been trickier that I thought, is all,” he admitted.

Merles eyes flicked to where Daryl had concealed the bracelet, but didn’t linger. “How’re you doing in here?” Daryl asked, before Merle could start in on him.

“Same old.”

Anything else was lost to him. Daryl’s head snapped around to the security door into the room as it opened, and another prisoner was ushered in by a uniformed guard.

He knew him without ever having to meet him. He knew the taste, feel and weight of his magic without ever having an impression of his form. Negan was a big man, but not bulky. He had keen, dark-burning eyes which moved across the room with a predatory leisure. His skin was paled after his time incarcerated, but still held the remains of a rich tan which seemed to darken his thick hair, combed neatly back from his face. He wore the orange jumpsuit like it was a tailored suit and when he walked, there was a fluidity to his movement which echoed the roll of his magic.

Daryl had noticed once, then he was young, that his grandmother moved like her magic. Light, quick steps almost like a dance. She barely left a mark upon the earth in her wake and Daryl could swear he heard bells when she moved. He’d wondered about it occasionally, about how his own steps were sure and silent, how he moved between the trees with such ease, not disturbing the earth and moving with the breeze. He’d wondered about how magic manifested in a caster, how a witch could embody their magic so entirely but show no sign of it on the surface. Now, he wondered if he’d been on the right track, if one’s magic did show through, if it couldn’t help but escape in movement and he’d just never had the chance to see it before.

As though magnetised, Negan’s eyes snapped towards Daryl, pulling his head around to face the brothers and halting his fluid steps. They hung in that moment together, existing on a plane beyond this world. Even from across the room, Daryl could feel Negan’s magic perk up in interest, sparking hot and strangely sweet with curiosity as his dark eyes bored into Daryl.

It was like when they met through Rick, in Daryl’s warm, dark spell-room. Their magic tugging against each other, the coven’s magic like barbed thorns and the feel of each of the casters, clear and distinct as they met Daryl on the strange other plane of life, where the world was brighter and clearer and condensed to the purest energies.

A thread, like a creeper reached out to Daryl, caressing across his skin, slow and curious, like the motion of Negan’s eyes which ran over him, taking in every detail as though the rest of the world didn’t exist.

Daryl released a thread of his own magic, uncurling it from the control he always kept it in check with. Too many years as a freak, as the strange boy the other kids didn’t want to play with meant he could never let it fly loose like he sometimes wanted to, like Negan let his. It made Negan seem bigger, wilder, more untamed and everyone could see it.

Daryl brushed his own feeler of magic against it and felt how Negan smiled at the sensation, his eyes interested.

“ _Daryl_.” Merle’s voice broke through the trance. It was low and sharp, as though it wasn’t the first time Merle had called his name trying to get his attention.

Daryl dragged his eyes away from the curious dark gaze of Negan and blinked his brother back into focus as the chaotic energy of the place rushed back in.

“The fuck are you doing?” Merle said, low and furious. Daryl felt a quick flash of panic that he’d been doing something without realising but a quick glance around showed nobody but Merle had noticed anything.

“That’s him.” Daryl said. Merle’s eyes barely flicked in Negan’s direction.

“I know. How the fuck do you?” Merle hissed, “what have you got involved with?”

“He’s like me.” Daryl said, at a loss for how to explain what had happened, how he’d met Negan’s magic, how it was so twisted up in hurting Rick and their town. He had no words to explain what it was like meeting someone magic like him, and how even though the magic he did was wrong and ugly and hurting someone Daryl cared about, Daryl was still curious to find someone who could do what he did.

Merle moved like a snake striking. His strong arm shot out, reaching across the small table that separated them and grabbed Daryl’s arm, pulling him forward and slamming his arm down across the tabletop.

“He is nothing like you,” he growled into Daryl’s face, his grip like a steel clamp around Daryl’s arm, “he may be magic but he is nothing like you. Don’t be fooled.”

A guard against the wall was coming at them, hand on his nightstick and shouting at Merle not to touch. People were looking towards them and Negan was watching, but his steps had resumed and he made his way to his waiting table, attention still fixed on the brothers.

Merle released Daryl’s arm and raised his hands out to the side at shoulder level as he sat back. The guard slowed and his grip on his nightstick loosed, but he didn’t release it.

A tense moment passed as the room lost interest and the guard looked between them, poised for action before nodding sharply and shot Merle a warning glance before returning to his post at the wall.

“Did one of his ‘friends’ die? The day before I called?” Daryl asked, keeping his voice calm and soft. Merle’s eyes narrowed at him and Daryl could see a muscle in his jaw twitch.

“The fuck have you got involved in?”

“Did he die?”

“Yes. An aneurism.” Merle bit out, “the fuck have you done?”

 “I didn’t do shit. He did.” Daryl snapped, temper worn short and head pounding.

Merle didn’t look convinced, the muscle in his jaw twitching again and his broad chest heaved with a deep breath. If they weren’t being watched, Merle would have tried to knock him to the floor like when they were kids, shoving his face into the dirt when he knew Daryl was being stupid and reckless, when Merle didn’t know how to protect him from himself. Daryl slumped into his chair as well as he could, “He cursed Rick… Rick Grimes.”

“The guy you went running across town to save? What is happening to you?”

Daryl lifted one shoulder and let it drop in a shrug, suddenly exhausted. He couldn’t tell Merle about the dead animals, the things that had been happening around town and the feeling of something wrong which had been lingering in the energy of the town, rubbing the wrong way along Daryl’s nerves and making him antsy. “It’s all connected,” he said eventually, “he was cursed arresting them.” he jerked his head towards the prison and the coven he knew was inside.

Merle opened his mouth but snapped it shut when the guard at the door signalled for the end of the visiting time. Merle and the others stood up.

“Stay the hell out of all this.” Merle said, “it ain’t your problem.”

“I can’t.” Daryl said, meeting his brother’s eyes and seeing understanding in them, even when Merle’s face twisted with frustration.

They nodded at each other in goodbye and Daryl watched Merle be led out of the room. When he vanished through the door, Daryl’s eyes were pulled towards Negan, who was already looking at him.

When he saw Daryl’s attention had returned to him, A smile spread across his face, curling at the edges with something wicked and unnamed. As he passed Daryl’s table, he nodded a pleasant greeting and continued on through the security door.

 

Daryl was half way home when he had to pull over, or risk crashing the bike. A rush of power shot through him. It was fireworks behind his eyes and like being kicked in the chest. Slumping over the body of the bike, he panted against the hot metal. He struggling to catch his breath as bile rose in his throat, and he shivered despite the hot sun beating down on him.

When he calmed himself enough, he was struck with the strange sense that this, whatever it was, it was _playful_. Somewhere in the world, and he suspected he knew where, someone was enjoying this, like a warning shot into a knee.

He pushed back against it, forcing the wrongness out and breathing the road dust and asphalt deep into his lungs. Feeling the breeze on his skin, he tied himself to the earth, drew the energy from the ground beneath him and pushed with all his might until the feeling was gone. He was left with the wispy impression of Negan. Anger, interest and amusement all mixed together

With shaky hands, he resettled himself on the bike and took a moment to collect himself before kicking off with a roar of the powerful engine. The need to move, a pull inside him which drew him back to Oak Haven started like an itch in the back of his mind, by the time he’d made it off the highway it was ants under his skin and he was viewing the world through tunnel vision, the road ahead of him all that mattered, the rest of the world fading away as he shot forward, not fast enough, though he had no idea what he was racing.

 

The pull took him to the nice, residential street that housed the Grimes Family.  He was off the bike and crossing the lawn before the engines roar had finished echoing through the street. As his boots made it onto the porch, he could hear noises and a baby crying coming from inside.

Twisting the handle of the door, Daryl felt the rush of magic from within, thick and heavy like the air in a swamp. He pushed the door open and braced himself for the rush of sensations which greeted him. There was magic and noise, the high, panicked voice of an adolescent and the wailing of a distressed baby almost covered the muffled thump and shuffle of what could have been a struggle.

Daryl’s feet followed the noise until he made it to the kitchen, with its cracking Formica countertop and the kitchen table he’d eaten at days before. Carl was on his knees on the ground, cradling his fathers head in his lap protecting it from hitting against the ground. Daryl spared a glance at Judith who sat in her high chair wailing and crying as though she, like Daryl, could feel the wrongness in the room.

Rick was seizing on the ground, his long limbs twitching and flailing as spasms wracked his body. Carl’s arms shook with the strain of keeping his dads head in his lap and he looked up at Daryl with wet, panicked eyes.

“Help him.”

“What happened?” Daryl demanded, crossing the cosy kitchen in two strides and sinking to his knees at Rick’s side.

“We were eating and suddenly he said he felt dizzy and then he went to stand up and he just fell down and started shaking.” Carl’s voice came out in a rush and Daryl could hear tears trying to choke off the words.

Daryl pressed his hands against Rick’s chest, palms down and fingers spread wide. He could feel the war beneath the skin without having to try. Negan’s magic hummed and burned, powered by his coven and a furious, bold savagery. Daryl tried to push against it, to pull from the earth like he had earlier, but it was too strong, and the Curtis house too detached from his familial core to draw strongly enough from it.

The Grimes family, though full of love and loyalty, were still grieving and finding themselves again. Their bond was still there, but it was straining under the pressure of months of upheaval and death, it wasn’t strong enough to pull over Rick as a barrier against the assault that was coming from within him.

Carl was still babbling, a mess of pleas and explanations which clashed with his wailing sister. The noise filled Daryl’s ears and wedged in his head, loud and agonising with the fear which shot through it, as heavy and pungent as the magic which was shooting through Rick’s veins. The barbed tendrils Daryl had tried to pluck clear from him, now moving with intent, spreading like fire through his battered and exhausted body.

Daryl curled himself over Rick, cradling his head off Carl’s lap and spreading his hands wide across his form, one hand cradling the back of his head and neck and the other against his back as he pressed himself against the other man, trying to drown out the noise of the room as he whispered and chanted anything he thought might help.

He felt a rush and the magic in the room surged, Rick’s body grew hot to the touch and Daryl struggled to hold on, willing his magic into the other man, clawing clumsily at the tendrils he felt wrapping around him, pulling at them helplessly and losing ground with every thorn which stuck and pulled his focus away from sustaining Rick.

Abruptly, Rick stilled. His whole body grew taut, the only sign of life being the slow, shallow breaths which moved his chest. Daryl pulled back and looked at the man beneath him.

He could still feel the foreign magic, pungent and oily, filling the air, but the seizing had stopped. Carl had grown silent, his eyes wide and fixed on his dad. Judith’s crying sounded far away, echoing strangely in the stillness.

Rick’s eyes snapped open and they darted around the room before coming to land on Daryl. A smile spread across his sharp features. It was a smile Daryl had never seen on the other man, whose smiles were always so warm and genuine, even when sadness and sickness shadowed his eyes, his smiles were always kind.

“Well, well, well,” Rick said, his voice slow and deep as treacle, “Dixon.”

Daryl swallowed, the taste of magic thick on his tongue, “Negan,” he rasped.

The smile broadened, and his eyes raked over Daryl.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So… you know when you plan things out roughly and you think ‘yeah, that would all go in one chapter’ and then you write it and it’s 9833 words? Yeah, that happened, and it’s taken me so freaking long to get it done. Which I’m really sorry about!
> 
> I hope you enjoy this, I’ve really enjoyed writing this fic, even if it turned out way bigger and completely absent of smut, which is the total opposite of what I planned when I started this story, so many moons ago. This was meant to be a really short, smutty Witch!Daryl story, well, you got Witch!Daryl at least. 
> 
> I can’t express my thanks enough for the wonderful and fantastic comment’s you’ve left me for this, you’ve all enjoyed it and that makes me so happy. Your kudos and kind words are the reason this story is finished, and are really appreciated, so thank you all so much! 
> 
> Without further faff from me, here is the final, very long, chapter and I hope you enjoy it!

When Daryl was eight years old, one of his daddy’s friends crashed on their couch for a couple of days. Martin was an unremarkable man, boring to look at and easily forgotten when he’d passed from view. Daryl had felt sick whenever he was in the same room as him.

Martin had been closer to Merle’s age than their daddy’s at the time, but Will Dixon had liked him about as much as he liked anyone. Martin laughed at his jokes, no matter how crude or offensive they were, and as a house guest, had ensured Will never ran dry of beer or spirits for the week he was there.

When Daryl looked at him, he saw a gaping black hole of hunger. The air around him had been sickly, polluted with something rotten. The one time Daryl had looked deeper, he’d rushed out of the house, banging the screen door against the wall with the force he exited with, and fell to his knees in the muddy snow behind their house and heaved until the fresh air had soothed him.

Martin, who was boring and pale and too eager to please men like Will Dixon, was unnatural inside. it was like something had scooped out everything that usually made up a man and replaced it with dark, twisting desires and a rabid hunger for destruction. When Daryl thought about it, he heard the tearing of flesh and the snapping of bones. He could almost feel sinew and tendons pulling and twisting between careless hands.  

Looking down at Rick staring up at him with a foreign expression, Daryl was reminded of Martin.

“Dad?” Carl’s voice came out on a quiver and Daryl and Negan’s eyes both snapped towards him. Carl looked scared, his face pale and his eyes wide as he took in his dad’s face, as though unsure what he was seeing.

“Carl, get Judith.” Daryl barked. His voice pulled Carl’s eyes away from Rick’s face, but he didn’t move. “Now. Get Judith.” Daryl insisted, and Carl nodded dumbly and scrambled to get up.

A hand reached up and gripped Carl’s arm before he could retreat. Broad, strong fingers which Daryl had admired for weeks clamped tight around his wrist, long fingers circling the limb easily.

“You can’t leave your old-man, not like this.” Negan said, tightening his grip, until his knuckles went white and Carl winced as he tried to pull his arm back.

Daryl wrenched Negan’s arm away from Carl. Negan’s grip slipped, co-ordination still clumsy in Rick’s body. Carl held his arm to his chest and crawled away, pulling himself up when he bumped into the table behind him, his eyes wide and frightened. Daryl held onto Rick’s arm, keeping an eye on Carl as he pulled the screaming and flailing baby from her high-chair, holding her awkwardly to his chest.

Daryl could feel the war beneath the skin under his fingertips. Rick’s skin was hot, like he had a fever, and there was a strange hollowness beneath the surface Daryl had never felt before.

Pushing through the magic that cocooning Rick’s body, Daryl tried to map the spell, to find the weak spots and figure out how to tear it from Rick’s body. It was a complicated and heady mix of magics, with the signatures of multiple witches knotted tightly together. It was colours and smells, mixed together and amplified by stone and metal with the taste of blood on his tongue and the feel of ash in his eyes. He waded through it like it was tar, blind and deaf to anything beyond the war of sensations he’d found within the other man.

For a moment, Daryl was lost in the whirling storm of the spell, diving too deep into it and he floundered to find his way out. Distantly, he felt his breath was growing short, air not reaching his lungs and his blood pumped deafeningly in his head, which felt like it might split open.  

“ _Dad! Stop!_ ” Carl’s voice floated through the mire, sounding thready and distant, like Daryl was underwater.

Daryl opened his eyes, though he didn’t know when he’d closed them. Negan’s teeth were bared and his eyes glittered as he focused on Daryl. Rick’s familiar features surprising him momentarily, Negan’s essence was so strong in the room, so encapsulating that there was barely any trace of Rick. If he wasn’t looking, Daryl wouldn’t know Rick was there.

Awareness returned, and Daryl realised there was a strong hand around his throat, stopping the air.

Pulling his magic back from the chaos he’d lost himself in, Daryl pushed it into the punch he threw. It landed expertly as one sharp, hard-knuckled knock into Negan’s kidney, followed immediately with a hit that dislodged his weakened grip from around Daryl’s throat.

Negan struggled to move, the hit to the kidney was a dirty move, but an effective one. It shocked the body, like a bolt of lightning which left a tenderness in its wake. It was enough of a distraction for Daryl to stand up and move out of reach, towards Carl and the wailing Judith.

He gasped in breaths which hurt his aching throat and blinked through the head-rush as air raced back through his body. Shaking the star-bursts from his vision, he heard Negan rise from the ground behind him. Daryl turned to face him, placing himself between Negan and the two children.

It was grotesque watching Negan move within Rick. Manipulating his body, moving around as though adjusting to an ill-fitted suit. He stood wrong, the strength carried in his shoulders. Daryl remembered the man as he’d seen him earlier that day, broad, dark and strong. Demanding the space he occupied.

It was wrong to see Rick’s body attempt it. Rick didn't need to demand space, the universe seemed to bow to his presence and people were pulled to him like gravity. He didn't swagger or display his strength, he moved like water, like a snake, where the deadliness of the killing strike was hidden by the fluidity of its movements.

“So, you’re Dixon’s baby brother,” Negan said. Rick’s low rumble sounding clumsy around the words. He usually spoke so gently, a smile present in his voice even when it wasn’t on his face.

Daryl remained silent, his eyes fixed on the other man. Looking at him was a bit like having double vision. His eyes saw Rick, though it was like seeing him through a funhouse mirror, slightly off and a little distorted, but his magic told him it was Negan and the wild energy he’d seen around the other man was there, creeping through the kitchen and exploring it curiously. “When I saw you with him, I knew who you were,” Negan continued, baring his teeth in a grin, “we’d met before.” His eyes raked over Daryl’s form, a slow, intimate look, as though he was taking in every detail of him. Daryl felt a flush rise to his cheeks to see Rick take him in like that, even though he knew there was nothing of Rick in that look.

Rick’s bright blue eyes flicked behind Daryl to the Grimes children and Daryl shifted to block his view of them. Negan leant sideways to look past him, his eyes assessing as he took in the siblings.

“Such a sweet little family Rick Grimes has got himself,” he said, voice sweetly curious, “it would have been kinder if he’d let the curse take him.”

“Carl,” Daryl said, “take your sister outside.”

“Daryl-”

“Do it.” he snapped. He only relaxed when he heard Carl retreat down the hall and felt his energy pass from the house.

Negan was smiling, an amused curl of his lips as he watched Daryl like he was a particularly interesting specimen in a jar.

“Was this your plan? Take over his body from jail?” Daryl asked.

“The plan was to kill him,” Negan said with a shrug. He looked down at Rick’s hands, cocking his head a little as though trying to see something there that he couldn’t quite make out. “He’s stronger than he seemed,” a muscle in his jaw twitched and his lips curled as though he’d smelt something unpleasant, “stubborn. And then he met you,” his eyes returned to Daryl, “sneaky little witch, trying to push me out.”

“He was pushing you out before he met me.” Daryl said and felt a prickle of pride for Rick.

Negan had underestimated the man, something he probably didn't do often. He hadn't understood the importance of a person's role in society. Teachers, doctors and lawmen weren't just modern constructs. They had always been there, in one way or another. It was their own kind of spark, different to Daryl's or any other witch’s but equally as important, guiding their way through life. In this life, or a hundred others, Rick would have been a lawman.

Even now, Negan didn't appreciate that, didn’t understand the network of energies which made up the world. Daryl sent a prayer up to his grandmother, and all the Murphy’s before her, who had collected and assembled the knowledge they kept in the large old Murphy house. They’d linked themselves to the town so many generations ago, and in doing so, had created a place of knowledge and understanding, at least within those walls.

The wild quality of Negan's magic, which flew loose and free around him, made Daryl think that he hadn’t had anything like that. He likely learned first through instinct, and later, through any resources he could find. It was the way a lot of witches learned.

It made them sloppy. Like a house build on sand, whatever they made or cast would never be as strong as it could be, unstable at the very core because they didn't learn the small things first. The subtlety of clove, the strength of charcoal, the minute reactions of elements when combined.

They were drawn, instead, to the showy, impactful magic which gave them a rush to cast. The smart ones, like Negan, tried to fill in the blanks later. But bad habits were hard to break, and they always ignored something. Ignored that there were sparks different to their own, but as important.

Rick was a cop as much as Daryl was a witch. Negan had ignored Rick’s strength of will when he cast his curse and hadn’t understood what he was working against, too sure of his own power.

Negan smiled. Daryl could imagine it being charming on the face he’d seen earlier that day. The dark, handsome man in prison, who drew people towards him with charm and easy smiles, and kept them there with fear.

“You and me, we’re alike,” Negan said, almost gently.

“I’m nothing like you.” Daryl could feel Merle’s iron grip around his wrist and the cold, steady focus of his eyes boring into Daryl.

“Why? Because you have your quaint little town? Your big bad brother? _Rick?_ None of them know you, can understand you. They can’t appreciate how bright you shine.” Negan moved closer as his spoke, his eyes fixed on Daryl and the air around him as though he could see the magic Daryl felt in his veins, like it was a physical thing. “My followers have sparks of magic, barely enough to light a candle on their own, but you, you glow. Imagine the things we could do. You and me.”

“You abuse your power,” Daryl said. Negan’s expression went cold.

“You neglect yours,” he stepped back, turning away from Daryl and scoffed, “let me guess, you make cute little tonics and spells. Fix things for people who don’t even like you. Don’t respect what you can do. You’ve spent your whole life trying to be like everyone else, but you never could. Always the freak, always that little bit off. They didn’t like that you knew when they were lying, fucking around, sick or sad. They didn’t understand, could never understand what you and me are like, what it’s like to see the world how we do, to bend nature to our will.”

Daryl had never had to bend the will of nature. He worked with it, belonged to it more than he’d ever belonged to the town,

Maybe they could have been the same, if circumstances were different, if Daryl hadn't learned so early on to listen to the nudges of nature, the whispers in the wind and the energy of the earth. The woods had raised Daryl as much as his grandmother had, and more than his daddy ever did.

He had no idea how Negan had grown up, what he could have gone through. but somehow, he didn't think his childhood had been that remarkable. For a man like Negan, that was the very worst hardship.

When he concentrated, pushed his awareness into the roots of what made the other man, Daryl could see a dark-haired boy who was too smart and too cunning for his surroundings. Who learned to manipulate people early on and that manipulating them was the best way to get what he wanted. That, and violence.

He could see a boy who grew bored with his normal life and unchallenging school full of dull-brained kids. When that boy learned that he could see and feel the world differently, and if he was clever enough, could manipulate the very air and the health and life of those around him, he took to it like a starving man.  

“Break this spell. Leave.” Daryl said, setting his weight and pulling his magic in around him, refusing to listen to the words which slipped too easily from the other man’s mouth.

Daryl had made peace with his place in the world a long time ago, no matter how much he had wanted someone like himself, someone who understood him, his loyalty was to the magic which had made him. Rick was a good, kind man with a family and Daryl would bring him back.

“Gonna stop me, Daryl?” Negan asked, taking a step towards him “Think you can do it without burning him up?”

The truth of that was cruel. People weren’t built to sustain the chaos of a spell like this. Negan would eventually burn out and kill his host, either returning to his own body, if his coven were maintaining it, or he’d have to find another body to inhabit. It was unnatural magic. It went against all the rules of the earth and reaped destruction in its wake. Fuelled by his coven, this spell was more dangerous than it first seemed. They could feed more energy into it than any one witch, and the corrosive backlash of the spell was spread between the castors.

Rick could die if it was left too long, or if Negan’s influence was too much for him to fight against. Rick was already weakened by grief and the curse and the months it had been wearing him down. There was a chance Rick wouldn’t live through this, even if Daryl did manage to cast Negan from his body.

Daryl reached for the salt shaker on the table beside him. Twisting the top off, he cast it aside before pouring the white particles into his palm. Daryl felt the clarity of the salt and pressed his will into every grain in the second before he launched it at the other man.

A spray of salt slashed through the air like the tongue of a whip, making impact with Negan’s face. The assault distracted Negan and Daryl took that second of confusion to launch himself at him. He could feel the strange hollowness when he made contact, but gritted his teeth and held strong. They grappled together and Daryl pressing every advantage he had.

Negan was still clumsy in Rick’s body, but with every minute that passed, he adjusted to his new form. Daryl had to act before they were evenly matched. He had no idea if he could fight Negan on his own, with him linked to his coven there was no telling if Daryl would survive.

When Daryl knocked Negan to the ground, he scrambled to straddle Rick’s wiry frame, A mirror of the time in Daryl’s back room, but this time there was no tenderness or trust which allowed Daryl to go deeper into another than he’d ever gone before, deeper than he’d believed you could go.

Before Negan could throw him off, Daryl pushed his fingers into Negan’s mouth and pried his teeth apart, upending the rest of the salt shaker he’d grabbed from the floor, into his mouth. He closed his hand over Negan’s mouth and pushed his magic into the salt, chanting through gritted teeth he let the salt purify a path within Rick where his magic could follow.

 A force exploded outward from Negan. Daryl was pushed from his position above him and onto the ground with his breath knocked out of him, leaving him blinking stars from his eyes as he looked up at the kitchen ceiling.

Negan lunged at him. A fist landed against his jaw, sending Daryl’s head back against the linoleum floor and making his vision swim. Daryl fought back like Merle had taught him to when he was a kid, scrappy and dirty, taking any advantage that he could. He’d never had to fight on two levels before, he was used to threading magic into his actions. His magic went unnoticed in the mix of emotions that came with a fight, and with Merle at his side, he didn’t need it to win.

Fighting Negan happened on multiple levels. They scrambled on the ground together, each working for every hit they landed. But Daryl also had to fight off the tendrils of magic Negan sent towards him, thorned and dangerous, intent on ripping Daryl’s control from him as he unworked the twisted knots of spells which tied Negan to Rick’s body.

With blood dripping from a split lip, Daryl grabbed Negan’s wrist and held on. The world melted away as their focus was tugged away from the physical. The air buzzed with energy, a hot, alive hive of magic which grew and amplified as the two men pushed their power against each other’s.

The air in the room grew thin. Daryl’s blood on his tongue tasted electric and he wanted to close his eyes and throw himself into the sensation. His magic let loose, wild and ferocious, uncaring of stigma or repercussions, every cell in him set on overpowering Negan.

He imagined a nuclear explosion when they peaked. Daryl felt like everything in him grew and expanded until he was nothing but the force of his magic which exploded out of him. Every molecule that remained tied to him vibrated and he could taste the edge of the earth on his tongue. When his magic met Negan’s, the world stopped turning and the two of them froze in their tableau of a struggle for an eternity,

Daryl reached deep into the other man, pushing himself beyond the thorns of Negan's coven, deep into the man he’d mapped so carefully days before and reached for the spark of Rick. Silver, gunpowder, strength, goodness, fatherhood and a fiery, astonishing anger burning deep within him. The taste of all that Rick was capable of. Rick seemed to reach for him, his spark moving to connect with Daryl’s magic and Daryl held it tight, pushing against the intrusion within Rick’s body and felt Negan flare with magic before receding from the fore.

When he drew in a breath, it burned. Daryl could feel the wind rushing against their forms and there was a roaring in his ears. As the world swam back into focus, he realised the roaring was his own pulse and his ears ringing, as though he’d been too close to a gun going off.

Lifting his head, he blinked at the chaos of the room. The windows had shattered, and glass sparkled like ice across the surfaces of the room, revealing a circle around their forms, as though the glass had come up against a wall around them. The ceiling light above them had also shattered and there was the smell of gunpowder and ash in the room.

Turning his attention back to Rick, Daryl felt fear grip his heart when he was still and silent beneath him. Tentatively, Daryl pressed his fingertips to Rick’s throat and held still, not daring to breath until he felt a pulse flutter beneath his fingertips.

Rick’s unique energy was closer to the surface, but Negan’s presence was still overpowering it.

When Daryl stood, the world swam and tilted. He made his way to the kitchen counter on wobbly legs and leant his weight against the cupboards as he started opening them and the drawers, blindly searching for anything he could use. There was a drawer of odds and ends by the fridge which had a mix of tools, pens, batteries and assorted scraps of a family.

There was a ball of twine and a lighter which he grabbed. He pocketed the lighter but took the twine to the sink which he plugged, before switching the tap on to cold and dumping the twine in the bottom, beneath the rush of water as he reached for the container of salt by the stove and the unopened packet of ground sage he’d found in one of the cupboards.

Upending the salt, he dumped most of it into the rushing water before tearing the plastic seal off the sage and repeating the process. The twine shifted in the water, pushed around by the current of the rushing water as it unravelled.

Daryl bent over the basin and blew a cleansing breath into the water from deep in his lungs, until he could feel the salt singing and could smell the sweet, sharp scent of cleansing water. It prickled across his skin when he reached into the basin and encouraged the twine to move and absorb as much as it could.

After another cleansing breath, Daryl pulled the twine out and carried it over to Rick’s still form, the cold water ran down his arms in rivulets which made his skin tingle.

Mouthing blessings and a binding, he wrapped the twine around Rick’s wrists and up his arms in snaking knots and lines like a creeping vine. Rick remained motionless, but Daryl could feel Negan’s magic vibrate with anger as the blessed twine was put in place.

“ _Mr Grimes? Rick?_ ” at first Daryl didn’t register the voice calling from the front of the house and he only looked up when he heard footsteps rushing into the house. “Mr Grimes? What the-”

A young man stumbled to a stop in the door of the kitchen, his dark eyes wide under the brim of his cap as he took in the shattered windows and chaos of the room, now with most of the cupboards and drawers left open. The man was wearing a uniform shirt, jeans and scuffed sneakers with his dark hair hidden under a baseball cap. He looked like a kid who’d accidentally landed a job, but when he saw Rick’s form on the ground he moved towards him, only hesitating when he saw Daryl kneeling beside him. His dark eyes turned wary and Daryl saw his throat bob when he swallowed nervously.

Daryl was momentarily distracted by the brightness of the other man’s energy, a bright, soft light which hummed pleasantly, swirling and flowing like a great lake, deep blue and calm at the centre with the smell of fresh cut grass, spices and hay.

“We need to get him to my shop.” Daryl said. The man’s eyes darted towards Rick before returning to Daryl.

“Is he okay? What did you do?” he asked, his voice quick and his eyes still fixed on Daryl as though expecting him to lash out.

“You got a car?” Daryl asked, ignoring him and moving to heft Rick off the ground, grunting under the weight of him.

“Yeah, of course-” the guy said, moving to steady Rick when Daryl’s hold on him slipped, “wait, man, what the hell are you doing?”

If the situation hadn’t been so dire, Daryl would admire the Asian man for seeing the room and coming in, ready to protect Rick and stand up to Daryl if he had to. Daryl grunted and adjusted his grip on Rick and shot the other man a dark look until he ducked his head in a nod and helped him move Rick out of the circle in the kitchen, towards the hall.

Carl was hovering by the front door, bouncing in place and holding his sister to him. His mouth fell open and his eyes went wide when he saw the three of them emerge from the kitchen.

He moved to come towards them, but faltered when Daryl shook his head and instead, watched them make their way towards him and out of the house.

“Does he need a hospital?” the Asian man asked, his energy buzzing and frantic beside Daryl.

“I need to get him to my shop,” Daryl repeated. On the curb by the house there was a beaten up blue car with a pizza shop name emblazoned across its side with no one inside. He nodded towards it, “that your car?” he asked. When the other man nodded, Daryl gripped Rick tighter and directed them towards it, shooting a glance at Carl and Judith. “get in the car,” he barked, and Carl scrambled to do so, his eyes wide and darting towards his dad, whose head was slumping forward between them.

“Wait, hold up,” the Asian man said, halting their progress, “hold up, what the hell is happening, Rick needs a hospital, and that is a baby, I can’t just have a baby loose in my car and I don’t even know you, man-”

“Glenn, it’s okay,” Carl said, pausing before getting into the car and looking back towards the men with wide eyes that looked older than their years in that moment, “he’s Daryl, dad trusts him.”

Glenn shot Daryl a dubious look but heaved a sigh and helped Daryl manoeuvre Rick into the car.

When Daryl stood up, closing the door gently so not to jostle Rick from his awkward sprawl on the backseat beside his son, he looked towards the house. From the front, there wasn’t much sign of the destruction at the back of the house. The front door stood open, and Daryl’s eyes slid away from it, remembering another time that something dark had happened in that house. The air was too transient to ever really be cleansed. It would keep the scars of Rick’s curse and take them into its foundations.

Shaking himself, he circled the car and climbed into the front passenger seat. They had to get moving and get to the shop, where Daryl would have the home turf advantage. He could feel Negan and his coven reassembling themselves, reforming to finish the spell and destroy any obstacle in their path.

The interior of the car smelled strongly of pizza and Daryl rolled down his window as he split his attention between the Grimes family in the back seat and directing Glenn through the streets of Oak Haven. He could feel the shop calling him across the town, as though knowing he needed the familiar and welcoming hum of its magic to sooth his own.

He was out of the car door before Glenn had completely stopped the car and circled around to Rick’s door as the car jolted and Glenn swore, craning his head to see Daryl from the driver’s seat.

Behind him, Daryl heard the bell above the shop door chime and felt Beth’s familiar sunshine energy bursting onto the street and coming towards them.

“Daryl? What’s- Oh god!” Beth let out a gasp when Daryl hauled Rick out of the car. He didn’t spare her a look, just settled his grip around Rick, grunting his thanks when Glenn appeared at his side and together they moved Rick towards the shop.

“Get the door,” he barked, and Beth rushed to do so.  He could hear Beth peppering questions at Carl, their voices rising over Judith renewed crying as she was pulled out of the car and Rick disappeared from view. From the shop, Daryl heard Aaron’s voice join the mix and gritted his teeth as the bell over the door continued to ring as they followed them into the shop.

Placing Rick carefully onto the ground in the back room, Daryl gestured for Aaron and Glenn to help him move the workbench out of the way when they followed him through the curtain into the back. They did so, and Daryl turned his eyes back to Rick’s form on his floor when the space was cleared.

“Beth, take the kids to your old man’s, Glenn will drive you.” he said. Voices rose in protest and Daryl shot the group a narrow-eyed look. “I don’t wanna fucking hear it, just go!” he snapped, and set about collecting ingredients from around the room without looking at or acknowledging them. Eventually, he heard their voices retreat and the bell above the door rang again.

“What’s wrong with him?” Aaron asked, from his place beside the door where he’d been watching Daryl silently.

“He’s possessed.” Daryl grunted.

“By a demon?” Aaron asked, his voice shaky and unsure.

“By a witch,” he said as he cut the corner of a bag of salt open.

“Is he going to be okay?” Aaron asked softly. When Daryl glanced towards him, his eyes were wide and fixed on Rick, taking in his sickly pallor and the eerie stillness of his form.

Daryl’s eyes shifted to Rick, but he pulled his attention away and focused on drawing an intricate circle around his splayed form, concentrating on getting the lines right. One large, circle that enclosed his form and trapped and funnelled the magic within, and consecutive swirling lines in a circle surrounding the first.

“I don’t know,” he admitted, keeping his eyes on his work. If he had a coven, like Negan did, he would be more sure of his abilities. Magic users bred in loneliness was never as strong as those surrounded by magic, and while the woods had welcomed Daryl into their innate, primal magic when he was a bare-footed kid chasing the wind, and his grandmother had always guided him, he couldn’t help but feel intimidated by the knotted web of Negan’s coven. A simple, basic coven, where magic was given and received, and together they were stronger.

“How can I help?” Aaron asked. Daryl surveyed the room before nodding towards the front shop.

“Get candles, lots of them.”

 

 

Rick stirred when Daryl stood back and inspected the room. Aaron was standing with his arms crossed over his chest in the doorway to the shop with Eric, who had closed the bakery early and joined Aaron when he hadn’t returned, just inside the doorway watching Daryl.

Rick grunted and his brow wrinkled as his breathing became more pronounced. He twitched, moving his arms and finding them bound. His eyes opened and he took in the room from his position on the floor.

“Rick?” Aaron asked from the doorway. Rick’s eyes moved to him and rested there for a moment before flicking towards Daryl.

“Help,” Rick rasped, his voice sounding raw as he turned back to Aaron. His struggles intensified, pulling against the bindings, panic setting in when they wouldn’t give. “He’s gone crazy, help me!” he begged, his blue eyes going wide and scared.

Aaron shifted and darted a look towards Daryl, his frown more pronounced. When Rick’s voice cracked on another desperate plea, Aaron took a faltering step forward and looked towards Daryl as Eric rested a hand on his shoulder, chewing his lip as he looked to Daryl for direction as well.

Daryl shook his head at them, “It’s not Rick,” he told them lowly.

“Listen to him!” Rick cried as he thrashed against the floor, “this is insane!”

“How did we meet, Rick?” Daryl asked, leaning against the workbench, feigning calm when every cell in his body was tense and on high alert.

He kept his eyes on Rick and saw when Negan gave up the charade. The same smile which had unsettled him at the Grimes’ home spread across Rick’s face and he stilled his struggles and relaxed back onto the floor.

“I’m sure it was lovely. He probably even made you breakfast in the morning, like a real gentleman.” Negan rolled his head back against the ground and let out a laugh, loud and booming like he was just a man in a bar who’d heard a great joke. Aaron shifted, moving so he was pressed back against Eric in the doorway, concealing him from view and reassuring himself with his presence.

The movement caught Negan’s attention and his cold eyes flicked towards them before returning to Daryl as he pulled himself up to stand, the movement clumsy with his arms tied. When he was standing, he looked at the twine binding him, twisting his arms and lifting them to get a better look and study the skin where it had gone red and tender from the blessed twine before letting them drop, interest lost as he turned and studied the room.

“I like this place,” he said at last, returning his eyes to Daryl, “You’ve tapped into something special here, didn’t you?” he ran his eyes down Daryl’s form, “you are full of surprises.”

“You should have stayed unconscious,” Daryl said.

“And let you have your wicked way with me? No, that wouldn’t do.” Negan studied the salt circles enclosing him and the symbolic offerings Daryl had placed at each point of the compass. At its core, it was a basic containment circle, but the layers of binding and suppression made it dense and heavy in the air. Negan opened his mouth to continue but snapped it shut and tilted his head curiously when Daryl’s head turned towards the shop, his attention caught by the feeling of familiar energies coming close, soon announced by the chime of the bell over the entrance.

Eric pulled the curtain aside and he and Aaron craned their necks to see the new arrivals.

Daryl could make out Maggie’s voice talking quickly to a male’s voice he thought was Glenn’s and the light footsteps of Beth on the shop floor. Daryl crossed the workroom, pushing past the two men in the doorway and blocking the entrance to the backroom.

“The hell are you doing here?” he demanded.

“You need our help,” Beth said, hands on hips as she squared off to him, “Carl told us what happened, and you can’t tell me this isn't dangerous-”

“You’re damn right it’s dangerous, that’s why you shouldn’t be here.”

“But you should? You’ve been worried for weeks, don’t think I haven’t noticed,” Beth snapped, her bright eyes wide as she took a small step towards him, “let us help,” she finished softly.

“ _Daryl!_ ” Eric’s high, panicked voice came from the backroom cutting off any reply. Daryl spared the trio in the shop one more glance before dashing back through the curtain.

Negan was standing tall in the centre of the circle, eyes closed and mouth moving soundlessly around words that held the rhythmic quality Daryl associated with spells and incantations. He could feel the magic brewing around the other man, strained against the confining power of the circle. The coven was pushing through, channelling themselves through the link with Rick.

Negan’s eyes opened, and he focused on Daryl. When he spoke, there was a strange quality to his voice, almost like an echo that didn’t quite match his words.

“There's still a chance for you to join me. Just think of it Daryl, think of everything we could do together,” his words slipped through the air and into Daryl’s brain, as slippery and insidious as his magic.

Daryl frowned, his attention caught by the off-key echo instead of the words which called to him of belonging and a community he’d never known.

The trio had followed him through the curtain and Daryl turned his attention to them and was surprised to find their attention fixed on Negan, seemingly rapt with what they were seeing. When Aaron took a small step towards the circle, slipping out of Eric’s grip on his arm which they both seemed to have forgotten about, Daryl intercepted him, grabbing his arm to stop him moving. When his hand made contact with the bare skin of his arm his shirt didn't cover, he could hear the strange echoing quality of Negan’s voice again, though it settled poorly underneath Negan’s voice as he kept talking to Daryl. Casting a look around the room, he studied their faces and felt his anger flare hot and potent when he realised they were all hearing something different and it was covering a spell Negan was attempting to weave through the group.

“Don’t listen to him,” Daryl barked, Beth looked towards him first and blinked her wide blue eyes at him before seeming to realise what was happening and turning to her sister, “whatever he’s saying, it’s not Rick. Don’t listen,” Daryl ordered, moving between the two bakers as Beth brought Maggie and Glenn out of their trances. “stay on guard or get out,” he said when he had their attention back.

The echoing voice stopped, and when Daryl looked back at Negan, he met his gaze and felt the tug and release of the binding twine around Rick’s arms release. The sensation of the binding breaking was like a drop of cold water down his spine. When he looked, livid red marks remained on Rick’s tanned skin and the twine was in a puddle at his feet. With one assessing glance around at the others, Daryl nodded to them.

“Surround him,” he barked and watched as they did as they were told, eyes on each other for cues before settling around the perimeter of the circle, “don't break the circle, no matter what,” Daryl turned back to Negan who snarled when Daryl faced him, Rick’s familiar voice warped with another man’s fury when he spoke.

“I’m going to skin your brother when this is over,” he said, “char his bones and feast on his heart. I will curse every bit of him and send them into the world. Every breath you take will be fetid with your brothers immortally rotting soul,” the echo was gone, replaced by a razor-sharp hatred which tasted black and like marrow on Daryl’s tongue.

Daryl caught Beth’s and Aaron’s hand’s as he nodded for the others to follow suit. Glenn’s eyes went wide as Maggie held his hand tightly, she shot him a bright smile before returning her attention to Daryl, her expression turning serious.

“What are you going to do, Daryl?” Negan called, raising his voice as the air in the room started to vibrate, wind coming from nowhere, buffeted by the energies building in the room.

Beth’s eyes were wide and frightened as the wind grew enough to become a gale, blowing Maggie’s hair into her eyes and sending flyaway strands of her own hair around her face. Daryl squeezed her hand in his and her wide eyes turned to him. He watched as she pushed the fear aside, determination spreading across her pretty face before she nodded at him, reaffirmed her grip in his and turned back to the man in the circle.

“You’re going to have to kill me to get me out, Daryl. You can’t do that without taking Rick with me,” Negan said, stepping forward until the toes of Rick’s scuffed boots butted against the edge of the salt circle. Despite himself, Negan’s eyes flicked to the salt, which, despite the wind and swirling energies which were filling the air with chaos, remained in place. “Even as clever as you are, you can’t win this.”

Daryl met Negan’s cold eyes. The coldness of them was out of place in Rick’s kind, handsome face. Rick’s essence and his soul had always whispered of what he was capable of, a steel core and blood stains alongside his spark of lawman, but Daryl had never seen it in action, had so rarely seen that potential in the cops he and his brother had dealings with. He could believe Rick was capable of coldness, of cruelty and even savagery, but Negan’s darkness sat poorly on him.

Meeting Negan’s eyes, Daryl sneered. “You have no idea what I can do,”

With that, Daryl turned his attention to the link of people connected to him. Their presence buzzed in his skin and he opened himself up to them in a way he never had before. Spreading his magic wide, he felt each one of the people surrounding him and linked them to him, more firmly than their connected hands. Beth’s familiar cornfield and sunshine warmed him, his strongest connection in the room, one he had surrounded himself with for years and which he felt deeply, a familial bond which was different to his one with his brother, but powerful in its own way. With her, his connection to the others grew stronger. Spice and lightning for Maggie. Fertile earth, yeast and sweet, crisp apples for Aaron and Eric, fresh cut grass and deep calm water for Glenn. Their energy welcomed him and he felt it filling him up, singing in his ears and every breath in was strong and restorative as his connection to them grew.

“ _Daryl!_ ” Aaron’s voice came through the rush of wind in the room. When Daryl looked, Aaron was staring above them at the ceiling where a swirling dark presence was growing and forming. It moved like oil in water, but was as intangible as smoke. Daryl could smell the oily scent of the curse. Negan was focused on it, his face set with pained concentration as he pulled on the manifested form of his curse, feeling the effects of it in Rick’s body, but needing every advantage he could get.

“Don’t break the circle!” Daryl shouted over the noise, his own eyes fixed on the form growing above them.

He’d caught glimpses of it, had chased the diseased effects of it across the town and had felt it and its connection with Rick, but seeing it here, a manifestation of a curse pushed out by an unbelieving, stubborn man, Daryl struggled to look away. It was unlike anything he’d ever seen or read about, it was a flaw, something that was never meant to be, corrupted and faulty magic, a mistake.

Pulling his attention back to Negan, Daryl pushed his awareness and his energy through the noise and chaos of the room which was just distraction. Deep into Rick’s form and to the knot of complex foreign magic within him.

The shop hummed beneath his feet, old, deep magic which existed long before humans and would remain long after them. He felt the woods, which were so much a part of him, and his connection to the people around him all came together. It was like that spell, days ago in the small back room, bathed in candlelight, where Daryl had touched Rick, had felt him like Daryl had never felt another person before, He drew on that memory to guide him and the sensation of connection to the town and the world around him urged him on.

The threads of the spell, tightly tangled signatures from eight separate casters slipped away under his touch. He touched the shape of Negan’s presence, a condensed and potent version of the magic which surrounded him. Daryl felt him struggle against his hold, like barbed thorns clawing against Daryl’s magic.

Beth’s small hand held his tightly, the sharp prick of her nails digging into his skin and he held it tighter. Aaron’s grip was firm and dry in his other hand, they tied him to the earth and stopped him from being swept away as he pulled Negan from Rick’s body and his essence moved upwards to join the swarming, swirling darkness above them. It welcomed Negan, pulsing with life as it joined with its caster.

Fire burned through the dark shadow and Daryl heard a couple of the people in the circle let out a gasp and a murmur of fear as the light flared before the room returned to the creeping false twilight it had sunk into without Daryl noticing.

Rick’s body crumpled to the floor. His curls circling his head like a dark halo and his limbs flung out at clumsy angles. Daryl's eyes were fixed on him, dread climbing in his throat when he remained still. Daryl had not been gentle when he pulled Negan from him and the amount of energy he'd poured into him, from the earth and the town, was a lot for anybody to handle.

Beth moved as though to go to him, but Daryl pulled her back before she could take a step.

“You can’t break the circle,” he told her, “we’re not done yet.”

His eyes were pulled back up to the darkness over their heads. It felt different with Negan’s raw energy added to it. Changing it yet again from a mutation of a curse to something far more dangerous. It enveloped Negan, and the swirling black was already becoming more focused, more intent as it shifted and moved, not just malignant energy corroding everything it came in contact with.

Rick groaned and his boot scuffed against the floor when he moved.

“Rick, are you okay?” Daryl called to him. Rick groaned again and let out a gasp when he tried to move.

“Daryl? What…?”

“You gotta stay in the circle, until we know it’s safe.” Daryl waited until Rick nodded his understanding before he dropped Aaron and Beth’s hands, gesturing for everyone to stay in place and darted across the room to his workbench.

He grabbed a silver bowl and a handful of oak ash, which he coated the inside of the bowl with. He knew where everything was in his workroom, he’d spent more time in this room since he brought the shop than anywhere besides the woods. He could move around the space with his eyes closed and not miss a single ingredient. It let him concentrate on the mental or spiritual side of the rituals and he lost himself in the instinctual routine.

A sharp cry of pain from behind him jolted him as he reached for a bottle of anise star oil to add to the bowl, which now contained bergamot and pine. Turning, he saw Aaron with his face turned away, his free arm raised to shield his face as the darkness came at him like a swarm of bees.

Quickly, Daryl reached for a bundle of sage and pulled the lighter from his pocket as he moved back towards the circle, it smoked and he blew on it until the smoke came thick and sweet.

“Pray!” he barked at Beth he who was watching in horror. She turned her wide eyes at him as he pushed the sage smoke at the darkness, “Your favourite prayer, when do you feel closest to god?” he turned, breathing his own prayers, wishes and blessings into the sage smoke and the darkness began to ease its assault on Aaron.

He felt when Beth began to sing, it wasn’t a prayer, but a song he knew she sang with the choir. It began softly and unsure, her sweet voice thready and wavering but became stronger when Maggie joined her, a rich, gentle melody which bolstered her sisters, combining perfectly. Daryl could feel it, it pressed against his skin like a warm bath, pure and kind and good. Passing the sage to Aaron, Daryl returned to the workbench waving for them to continue.

Pouring Eucalyptus oil into the waiting bowl, he could feel the wind building behind him and when he shot a glance back, he saw Rick curled up in a ball on the ground, protecting himself as best he could as the darkness rained down on him. The others clutched at each other, trying to remain in place around the circle their voices joining the sisters, barely heard over the wind. He could feel their fear, sharp and astringent, growing with the onslaught from all sides. He could feel stings against his skin and knew the others could too, sharp spots of pain like bee stings where the darkness touched them.

He dropped a couple of snake vertebrae and uncorked a bottle of deer blood he rarely used and emptied it into the bowl, it swirled in the oils and it turned dark. When he lifted a knife to his own hand and cut his palm, enough to add a couple of drops of his own blood, the mixture went darker, seeming to consume the light around it, not simmering and reflecting like oils should.

He turned back to the circle, hunching his shoulders against the rush of wind and stinging magic which rushed at him. He saw Glenn’s hold on Eric slip and they both scrambled to grab the other, but the energy of the room was too powerful, pushing them apart. The circle was collapsing, he could feel the salt circles losing their power and he knew Negan wouldn’t be contained if they gave way.

Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out the heavy silver chain Merle had stolen for him. It hummed in his hand, the history of the man seeming to vibrate amidst the magic of the room. The shadow seemed to throb, as though Negan recognised the item even through the chaos of his spells.

Dropping it into the mixture in the silver bowl, Daryl felt a rush of power. Negan and the curse surged towards him and Daryl let out a shout which sounded like a roar, pouring his fear and worry into one powerful noise which carried his magic along with it as he flung the bowl, spilling the mixture into the air. It soared, filing the air like diamonds and Daryl could feel the threads of Negan’s possession disintegrating.

The curse shivered in the air. There was a moment of stillness before Negan’s energy burned bright and hot, Daryl felt the pop of a life forfeited and the darkness shifted in the air. Daryl saw it moving towards Rick with deadly intent, using the last of its energy and the lives of Negan’s coven if it had to, to finish him, and Daryl moved.

The salt crunched under his boot as he rushed forward, crossing the intricate circles, kicking up salt as he rushed to Rick’s side. He crashed into Rick as the shadow rushed at them. His arms curled protectively around Rick, his strong, wiry frame fitting into his arms and his curls soft as it slipped between his fingers as he cradled his head. Daryl felt the impact of the shadow against his back like claws sinking into his flesh. The others were shouting and calling their names, frightened and loud. Daryl could feel them, bright spots of emotion which burned hot, like beacons of light in their positions around the circle, where they remained.

Daryl drew them in, reconnecting to them. Their energy slammed into him and he felt the threads which bound them to their families and the town. In his arms, Rick held him back tightly and his energy joined the web. Daryl wielded it like it had always been his, it called to him like the woods and the earth magic he’d always belonged to. It pressed out of him, slamming into the darkness with the force of a town behind it and he lost himself in it, in the magic place where worlds began and ended, stars burst and galaxies shifted.

He could feel the lives of every person in the town, they hummed in his chest, each life brilliant and beautiful, a star that burned hot and bright, linked together by a million little threads. He could reach out and touch them, catch the brightness with his fingers and they opened up to him, linking with him until he ceased to be a man and became a vessel for the power which formed the world. He felt joyous, more alive than he’d ever been, no longer contained by flesh he moved with the air, he _was_ the air and when he plucked the rotten smear of the Negan from the room, his power burst, and it felt like a supernova beginning from Daryl’s very centre.

In the moment of stillness which followed, Daryl could feel the energy of the town easing from the torment which had whispered at its edges, infecting it.

Slowly, regretfully, Daryl let go of the town, pulled himself back through the threads which tied them together and as the power slipped from him like waves returning to the ocean, his consciousness slipped away.

 

Daryl’s dad once knocked him so hard he fell against the kitchen counter head-first. He blacked out and woke up later with the world tilting to one side and a slow slur to his words for another hour. For the next three days he hurt and felt exhausted. He’d lain on his bed for most of it, his window open and his eyes on the sky outside. A bird had stood sentry over him from the windowsill and one of his strongest memories of those few days was the sweet trill of birdsong.

When Daryl woke this time, he could feel the familiar hum of the shop backroom surrounding him, it hummed in his bones and offered comfort as his muscles shook and felt weak and leaden.

Forcing his eyes open, the ceiling of the small room in the back of the shop swam slowly into focus. He had to blink a few times to get the familiar runes and markings he’d painted on the surface to come into focus, but closed his eyes once he’d achieved it, exhaustion weighing his lids back down.

“Daryl?” Rick’s voice was a gentle whisper. Daryl almost thought he imagined it, until he felt a cool cloth press against his brow. He was struck with the strangeness of the action. He’d seen it in movies, but nobody, not his grandma or his mom had ever wiped his brow. Prying his eyes open again, he rolled his head to the side and saw Rick sitting cross-legged on the ground beside him.

The door to the room was closed and it was lit with a handful of plain white candles which gave off a gentle scent of carnations and filled the room with a warmth which went beyond the heat given off by the flames.

“How do you feel?” Rick asked.

“Like shit,” Daryl rasped, moving to sit up but giving up on the idea when the world swam. Rick rested a big, gentle hand on his shoulder and eased him back down.

“I’m not surprised. You’ve been out of it for two days.” Rick said, rubbing Daryl’s shoulder absently in a soothing circle.

Daryl’s eyes snapped open and he pushed himself up, despite Rick’s hand.

“Two days?” he repeated, struggling to make sense of the words.

“Every time we tried to take you to a hospital you’d get agitated and things would start flying off the walls,” Rick continued, “only place you relaxed was in here.”

Daryl pulled himself up the rest of the way until he was sitting, his knees rested against Rick’s and he looked at the other man. He looked drawn and pale still, but the blur of shadow over his chest was gone and his eyes looked clearer and sharper than he’d ever seen them.

Rick was studying him too and Daryl wanted to weep to see no trace of Negan left in him. His eyes were soft and kind, despite their sharpness and Daryl wanted to lose himself in them.

Shaking himself, he rubbed at his eyes and flexed his stiff fingers. He felt off, like his body was still asleep and it was only his magic allowing him to move.

“How’re you?” he asked Rick softly. Rick smiled.

“Better now. What you did…” his hand squeezed Daryl’s shoulder and he leant into the contact, “it was amazing.”

“Everyone’s okay?” he asked and Rick nodded.

“We’re all a bit shaken up, but yeah. Beth had to be dragged away from your side, she’s been so worried. We all have,” he gave Daryl a stern look, but his hand rubbed reassuringly down Daryl’s arm, “there’s been no sign of… whatever that was.”

“Negan,” Daryl rasped.

Rick frowned. “Negan? Cult-leader Negan?” he slumped backwards, and his hand fell away from Daryl’s wrist where it had stilled. Daryl stared at where Rick’s touch had been and felt suddenly empty to have it gone. Without letting himself think about it, he reached forward and hooked his fingers into Rick’s palm in a loose hold. Rick’s expression shifted into a smile, the shadows of memories slipped from his features and he squeezed Daryl’s fingers and held on.

Daryl’s eyes were drawn to the marks which criss-crossed Rick’s arms, left from the binding twine. They were a faded pink, slightly raised but didn’t look like they’d scar. He made a mental note to make a balm for them to make sure they didn’t linger, but was distracted when Rick spoke again.

“Not sure what we’re going to do now,” Rick said absently, running his thumb along the skin on Daryl’s hand, “I need to start looking for a place now that home is… well,” his eyes flicked up to Daryl’s face, but there was no reproach there.

Daryl nodded. He couldn’t let them move back into the Curtis house, it had been witness to too much darkness, it could never be a good home for the Grimes family now.

“Move into mine.” he said. Rick huffed a laugh.

“That’s nice, but I don’t think there’s room.” he smiled at Daryl with the same fondness he’d directed at Daryl for months now. Daryl shook his head, caught by the idea now that he’d had it.

“No, my grandmother’s house,” he said, holding Rick’s hand tighter, “it’s a family house, should have a family in it.”

 Rick frowned, but there was no anger of annoyance in it and the fond smile didn’t shift from his lips. Daryl watched as he opened his mouth and closed it a couple of times without speaking, before he shook his head and huffed a laugh.

“I’m going to kiss you, Daryl.” he said softly, and leant in to press his lips against Daryl’s in a soft kiss.

Daryl’s magic buzzed, sparking against the silver and gunpowder energy of Rick and Daryl felt like he had in the moment of purest magic, of connection so perfect the world shifted.

Against his lips, Rick smiled.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thank you all for reading, have a great new year and Rickyl on, everyone!
> 
> I have no sequel planned, and it's unlikely I'll ever get round to one, as I've got a few other projects lined up. Though, if people want, they're welcome to take a stab at it! Just drop me a line!   
> <3


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